National Popular Vote is good for conservatives, the GOP, and public policy. Period.
Having been active in support of the initiative for over a year now, I have met and talked to hundreds of conservative leaders, activists, and elected officials. I have found most of those who reflexively oppose it do so because they think it is a process to amend the Constitution, don’t understand how it works or how it would affect outcomes, or are convinced of some grand conspiracy to turn America into a permanent Democrat hegemony.
The reality is the current system disenfranchises millions of conservatives from the process of electing the president, encourages pandering that transcends ideology (ethanol for Iowa, steel tariffs for West Virginia), and excludes 35 states from relevance in determining the Leader of the Free World. 
National Popular Vote is not ideological. In fact, both sides of the divide have found reasons to support the plan. What else can explain the strange union of Tom Tancredo and (allegedly) George Soros?
But it’s complicated. Since conservatives, me included, think “hell no!” the first time they hear about it, it takes time to understand it and realize how much it helps our nation’s governance and our movement’s objectives. I have been in meetings with dozens of Republican legislators, spending hours going through how it works, constitutional history, Founders’ intent, and the impact it would have on the process.
Almost all of them begin the discussion opposed to the idea. After taking the time to learn more, I’d say 80% leave supporting it. These policymakers were not brainwashed, but rather took considerable time to consider the plan on the merits.
The fact is, however, it takes 30 seconds to oppose National Popular Vote and 30 minutes to support it. In today’s world, that’s a tough sell.
National Popular Vote has been signed into law in California, unfortunately without the Republican support it deserved. A number of elected Republicans were subjected to threats and harassment for a bill considered to be a fait accompli, and it just wasn’t worth the political capital to remain in support. Such is the hallmark of the California Republican Party: it is better to fight each other over anything than fight Democrats. It is this kind of intramural fratricide that has helped us become a party lacking any relevance whatsoever in public policy.
In 2008, California donors contributed $150 million to John McCain and Barack Obama. Of that, a mere $29,000 was spent in the state. Our irrelevance, as the largest state in the union and the 8th largest economy in the world, is terrifying. Look around our state and see what unchallenged liberal governance has gotten us.
How’s the economy doing? How about your tax bill? Making a lot of progress on protecting the unborn? Feeling a little bit safer with your concealed carry permit? Proud of Senate and Assembly Republicans impact on the FY12 budget?
What Republicans have been doing in California is not working. Forcing the RNC and our presidential nominees to commit to California and make the kind of infrastructural investment required to be competitive down ballot is critical to rebuilding our party. Absent that, I guarantee you the movement to moderate the GOP to be attractive to independents will only increase, leaving conservatives in the dust.
Our ideas are right and we should not abandon them.
First, Jason, I’ve found that most people “on the right” who support NPV are paid to do so. Have you received any money from NPV?
Second, while I’m sure you’ve met some people opposed to NPV who don’t understand it, there are plenty advocates for NPV who don’t understand it also. I’m not sure what your point is by starting your argument that way, except to throw in a bit of elitism.
Third, NPV is not good for conservatives. The transaction costs of political organizing decrease as population density increases; that is to say, it’s easier to organize 1000 voters in a city than 1000 voters in a rural area. Anyone who’s done a fair bit of doorbelling will get this. The basic Electoral College math gives a political boost to lower population states–the same math that Congress is based on. (As an aside, the most honest supporters of NPV (not the paid ones) want to change or eliminate the U.S. Senate for the same reason that they want effectively to eliminate the Electoral College.) National Popular Vote would shift power to the cities. Worse, because states would be forced under NPV to take other states’ word for it on their election totals, the risks of corrupt political machines developing in the most partisan states is radically increased by NPV.
Fourth, NPV isn’t good for Republicans. The RNC is a representative body with a lot of very savvy members, people who have been around campaigns and elections for a long time. They voted 118 to zero (one abstention, possibly NPV lobbyist Saul Annuzis) for a resolution strongly condemning National Popular Vote.
Fifth, most importantly, NPV is bad for our nation. The Electoral College creates an underlying set of incentives in national politics that drive candidates away from the most radical states and toward the most balanced. This is healthy. NPV says this causes interest group politics and some voters to get more attention than others, but anyone familiar with politics in a single-member district will understand that direct election is no panacea in either area.
Trent,
It’s startling news to me that “the most honest supporters . . . of NPV want to change or eliminate the U.S. Senate.” Can you back up that claim?
Are you implying that the New York Senators in their Republican-controlled Senate want to change or eliminate the U.S. Senate and were paid to pass the National Popular Vote bill on June 7, 2011 by a 47–13 margin, with Republicans favoring the bill by 21–11? Republicans endorsed by the Conservative Party favored the bill 17–7.
As Jason has said before:
“National Popular Vote is not a change that can be easily explained, nor the ramifications thought through in sound bites. It takes a keen political mind to understand just how much it can help . . . Republicans. . . .Opponents either have a knee-jerk reaction to the idea or don’t fully understand it. . . . We believe that the more exposure and discussion the reform has the more support that will build for it.”
The RNC could have benefitted from more exposure to and discussion of NPV.
National Popular Vote is based upon the Founding Fathers leaving the choice of method for selecting presidential electors exclusively to the states by adopting the language contained in section 1 of Article II of the U.S. Constitution– “Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors . . .” The U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly characterized the authority of the state legislatures over the manner of awarding their electoral votes as “plenary” and “exclusive.”
Supporters find it hard to believe the Founding Fathers would endorse an electoral system where 2/3rds of the states and voters now are completely politically irrelevant. Presidential campaigns spend 98% of their resources in just 15 battleground states, where they aren’t hopelessly behind or safely ahead, and can win the bare plurality of the vote to win all of the state’s electoral votes. Now the majority of Americans, in small, medium-small, average, and large states are ignored. Virtually none of the small states receive any attention. That’s over 85 million voters. None of the 10 most rural states (VT, ME, WV, MS, SD, AR, MT, ND, AL, and KY) is a battleground state. 19 of the 22 lowest population and medium-small states, and 17 medium and big states like CA, GA, NY, and TX are ignored. Once the primaries are over, presidential candidates don’t visit or spend resources in 2/3rds of the states. Candidates know the Republican is going to win in safe red states, and the Democrat will win in safe blue states, so they are ignored. More than 85 million voters have been just spectators to the general election. States have the responsibility and power to make their voters relevant in every presidential election.
National Popular Vote doesn’t claim to be a panacea.
The National Popular Vote bill would guarantee the Presidency to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states (and DC).
The National Popular Vote bill is a state-based approach. It preserves the Electoral College and state control of elections. It changes the way electoral votes are awarded in the Electoral College. It assures that every vote is equal and that every voter will matter in every state in every presidential election, as in virtually every other election in the country.
Under National Popular Vote, every vote, everywhere, would be politically relevant and equal in presidential elections. Every vote would be included in the national count. The candidate with the most popular votes in all 50 states would get the 270+ electoral votes from the enacting states. That majority of electoral votes guarantees the candidate with the most popular votes in all 50 states wins the presidency.
National Popular Vote would give a voice to the minority party voters in each state. Now their votes are counted only for the candidate they did not vote for. Now they don’t matter to their candidate. With National Popular Vote, elections wouldn’t be about winning states. No more distorting and divisive red and blue state maps. Every vote, everywhere would be counted for and directly assist the candidate for whom it was cast. Candidates would need to care about voters across the nation, not just undecided voters in a handful of swing states.
With National Popular Vote, every vote, everywhere, would be politically relevant and equal in presidential elections. There will be nothing special about a vote cast in a big city or big state. When every vote is equal, candidates of both parties will seek out voters in small, medium, and large towns throughout the states in order to win. A vote cast in a big city or state will be equal to a vote cast in a small state, town, or rural area.
The population of the top five cities (New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston and Philadelphia) is only 6% of the population of the United States and the population of the top 50 cities (going as obscurely far down as Arlington, TX) is only 19% of the population of the United States.
21% of Americans live in rural areas.
The current state-by-state winner-take-all system of awarding electoral votes maximizes the incentive and opportunity for fraud. A very few people can change the national outcome by changing a small number of votes in one closely divided battleground state. With the current system all of a state’s electoral votes are awarded to the candidate who receives a bare plurality of the votes in each state. The sheer magnitude of the national popular vote number, compared to individual state vote totals, is much more robust against manipulation.
Senator Birch Bayh (D-Indiana) summed up the concerns about possible fraud in a nationwide popular election for President in a Senate speech by saying in 1979, “one of the things we can do to limit fraud is to limit the benefits to be gained by fraud. Under a direct popular vote system, one fraudulent vote wins one vote in the return. In the electoral college system, one fraudulent vote could mean 45 electoral votes, 28 electoral votes.”
Hendrik Hertzberg wrote: “To steal the closest popular-vote election in American history, you’d have to steal more than a hundred thousand votes . . .To steal the closest electoral-vote election in American history, you’d have to steal around 500 votes, all in one state. . . .
For a national popular vote election to be as easy to switch as 2000, it would have to be two hundred times closer than the 1960 election–and, in popular-vote terms, forty times closer than 2000 itself.
Which, I ask you, is an easier mark for vote-stealers, the status quo or N.P.V.[National Popular Vote]? Which offers thieves a better shot at success for a smaller effort?”
Neither the current system nor the National Popular Vote compact permits any state to get involved in judging the election returns of other states. Existing federal law (the “safe harbor” provision in section 5 of title 3 of the United States Code) specifies that a state’s “final determination” of its presidential election returns is “conclusive”(if done in a timely manner and in accordance with laws that existed prior to Election Day).
The National Popular Vote compact is patterned directly after existing federal law and requires each state to treat as “conclusive” each other state’s “final determination” of its vote for President. No state has any power to examine or judge the presidential election returns of any other state under the National Popular Vote compact.
Part of the genius of the Founding Fathers was allowing for change as needed. When they wrote the Constitution, they didn’t give us the right to vote, or establish state-by-state winner-take-all, or establish any method, for how states should award electoral votes… Fortunately, the Constitution allowed state legislatures to enact laws allowing people to vote and how to award electoral votes.
Quite frankly, I’m glad that CA is irrelevant in presidential elections because we are such a liberal state. NPV disenfranchises conservative small states in favor of liberal big ones. Does anyone think that’s good for the GOP?
Can you imagine what would happen if there was a very close election? How would you like to see Florida’s Bush v. Gore times 51? How much easier is it to manufacture votes in liberal big cities than in the small towns of America?
Of course the whole thing is unconstitional for 2 reasons:
The 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause forbids one person’s vote to be worth more than another’s, which would happen if your state votes for candidate A’s electors, but candidate B wins the NPV, your vote would be null and void. There’s a good discussion of this here: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2761313/posts
The second reason is that the Constitution forbids states from making compacts with each other:
Article I, section 10:
“No State shall, without the Consent of Congress, lay any Duty of Tonnage, keep Troops, or Ships of War in time of Peace, enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State, or with a foreign Power, or engage in War, unless actually invaded, or in such imminent Danger as will not admit of delay.”
The CA bill (AB 459) that was just signed into law even calls it a compact.
There are very good reasons why the GOP is against NPV.
NPV also misreads the basic Electoral College provision, which says “Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct….” It does not say “the legislature shall appoint,” but says that the state appoints (that’s the “who”) by a process determined by the legislature (the “how”). NPV conflates the “who” and the “how” in a way that is probably unconstitutional and that clearly violates the intent of the Founders.
The Constitution allows the legislature to figure out how best to represent their state in the presidential election process. But it does not allow the legislature to throw their own state under the bus. That is, the legislature must in some way be representing the actual will of the state, not something external to the state–like a purported national vote total. NPV is very likely unconstitutional.
When NPV lobbyist Saul Annuzis was confronted with this argument in a debate before the RNC, he told the audience that “none of us are smart enough to figure things like this out” and that ultimately these kind of questions are supposed to be figured out only by the Supreme Court. (Audible gasp in the room; game over Saul.)
With National Popular Vote, every vote, everywhere, would be politically relevant and equal in presidential elections. Every vote would be included in the national count. The candidate with the most popular votes in all 50 states would get the 270+ electoral votes from the enacting states. That majority of electoral votes guarantees the candidate with the most popular votes in all 50 states wins the presidency.
National Popular Vote would give a voice to the minority party voters in each state. Now their votes are counted only for the candidate they did not vote for. Now they don’t matter to their candidate.
Above I thoroughly discussed how the current system maximizes the incentive and opportunity for fraud.
Recounts are far more likely in the current system of state-by-state winner-take-all methods.
The possibility of recounts should not even be a consideration in debating the merits of a national popular vote. No one has ever suggested that the possibility of a recount constitutes a valid reason why state governors or U.S. Senators, for example, should not be elected by a popular vote.
The question of recounts comes to mind in connection with presidential elections only because the current system so frequently creates artificial crises and unnecessary disputes.
A nationwide recount would not happen. We do and would vote state by state. Each state manages its own election and recount. The state-by-state winner-take-all system is not a firewall, but instead causes unnecessary fires.
Given that there is a recount only once in about 160 statewide elections, and given there is a presidential election once every four years, one would expect a recount about once in 640 years under the National Popular Vote approach. The actual probability of a close national election would be even less than that because recounts are less likely with larger pools of votes.
The average change in the margin of victory as a result of a statewide recount was a mere 296 votes in a 10-year study of 2,884 elections.
No recount would have been warranted in any of the nation’s 56 previous presidential elections if the outcome had been based on the nationwide count.
The 2000 presidential election was an artificial crisis created because of Bush’s lead of 537 popular votes in Florida. Gore’s nationwide lead was 537,179 popular votes (1,000 times larger). Given the miniscule number of votes that are changed by a typical statewide recount (averaging only 274 votes), no one would have requested a recount or disputed the results in 2000 if the national popular vote had controlled the outcome. Indeed, no one (except perhaps almanac writers and trivia buffs) would have cared that one of the candidates happened to have a 537-vote margin in Florida.
Article I-Section 10, Clause 3 of the U.S. Constitution specifically permits states to enter interstate compacts. In fact, there are hundreds of major compacts currently in force (and thousands of minor ones), as can be seen at
http://tinyurl.com/3ra7elc
“oldgulph,” if you’re surprised that those who want to do away with the Electoral College also want to do away with the current U.S. Senate, all that tells us is that you’re not well read on the subject. Try Daniel Lazare or Yale’s Robert Dahl. One of my problems is that I’ve been studying this issue since before lotto monopolist Koza started NPV and even before November 2000. This is not a new discussion, though it’s new to many.
Republican legislators who sign on to NPV are subject to a multi-million dollar lobbying effort by co-opted “Republican” lobbyists. This, again, is clear.
And the RNC had tremendous exposure to this issue, including one of their own who is on NPV’s payroll. We had a full debate right there at the meeting, and the discussion as been going on for some time. If you think they didn’t consider this in depth, you don’t know what you’re talking about.
As to all your cut and paste from NPV’s talking points, I’ll let people read the other side at SaveOurStates.com and leave it at that.
rrent,
I challenged you to substantiate your claim. You haven’t.
I said.
It’s startling news to me that “the most honest supporters . . . of NPV want to change or eliminate the U.S. Senate.” Can you back up that claim?”
In EVERY VOTE EQUAL: A State-Based Plan For Electing The President By National Popular Vote, it is clearly stated:
● The equal representation of the states in the U.S. Senate is explicitly established and protected in the U.S. Constitution and cannot be affected by passage of any state statute.
● The National Popular Vote plan does not affect the equal representation of the states in the U.S. Senate.”
“Equal representation of the states in the U.S. Senate is explicitly established in the U.S. Constitution. This feature cannot be changed by state law or an interstate compact.
In fact, equal representation of the states in the U.S. Senate may not even be amended by an ordinary federal constitutional amendment. Article V of the U.S. Constitution provides:
“No State, without its Consent, shall be deprived of its equal Suffrage in the Senate.”
Thus, this feature of the U.S. Constitution may only be changed by a constitutional amendment approved by unanimous consent of all 50 states.
In contrast, the U.S. Constitution explicitly assigns the power of selecting the manner of appointing presidential electors to the states. The enactment by a state legislature of the National Popular Vote bill is an exercise of a legislature’s existing powers under the U.S. Constitution.
In short, enactment of the National Popular Vote compact has no bearing on the federal constitutional provisions establishing equal representation of the states in the U.S. Senate.”
http://www.every-vote-equal.com/
So all of these Republican supporters have been bought and co-opted?
By state (electoral college votes), by political affiliation, support for a national popular vote in recent polls has been:
Alaska (3) — 66% among (Republicans), 70% among Nonpartisan voters, 82% among Alaska Independent Party voters
Arkansas (6) — 71% (R), 79% (Independents).
California (55)– 61% (R), 74% (I)
Colorado (9) — 56% (R), 70% (I).
Connecticut (7) — 67% (R)
Delaware (3) — 69% (R), 76% (I)
DC (3) — 48% (R), 74% of (I)
Idaho(4) – 75% (R)
Florida (29) — 68% (R)
Iowa (6) — 63% (R)
Kentucky (8) — 71% (R), 70% (I)
Maine (4) – 70% (R)
Massachusetts (11) — 54% (R)
Michigan (16) — 68% (R), 73% (I)
Minnesota (10) — 69% (R)
Mississippi (6) — 75% (R)
Nebraska (5) — 70% (R)
Nevada (5) — 66% (R)
New Hampshire (4) — 57% (R), 69% (I)
New Mexico (5) — 64% (R), 68% (I)
New York (29) – 66% (R), 78% Independence, 50% Conservative
North Carolina (15) — 89% liberal (R), 62% moderate (R) , 70% conservative (R), 80% (I)
Ohio (18) — 65% (R)
Oklahoma (7) — 75% (R)
Oregon (7) — 70% (R), 72% (I)
Pennsylvania (20) — 68% (R), 76% (I)
Rhode Island (4) — 71% liberal (R), 63% moderate (R), 35% conservative (R), 78% (I),
South Carolina (8) — 64% (R)
South Dakota (3) — 67% (R)
Tennessee (11) — 73% (R)
Utah (6) — 66% (R)
Vermont (3) — 61% (R)
Virginia (13) — 76% liberal (R), 63% moderate (R), 54% conservative (R)
Washington (12) — 65% (R)
West Virginia (5) — 75% (R)
Wisconsin (10) — 63% (R), 67% (I)
Wyoming (3) –66% (R), 72% (I)
http://nationalpopularvote.com/pages/polls.php
In Gallup polls since 1944, only about 20% of the public has supported the current system of awarding all of a state’s electoral votes to the presidential candidate who receives the most votes in each separate state (with about 70% opposed and about 10% undecided). Support is strong among Republican voters, Democratic voters, and independent voters, as well as every demographic group surveyed in virtually every state surveyed in recent polls in closely divided battleground states: CO – 68%, FL – 78%, IA 75%, MI – 73%, MO – 70%, NH – 69%, NV – 72%, NM– 76%, NC – 74%, OH – 70%, PA – 78%, VA – 74%, and WI – 71%; in smaller states (3 to 5 electoral votes): AK – 70%, DC – 76%, DE – 75%, ID – 77%, ME – 77%, MT – 72%, NE 74%, NH – 69%, NV – 72%, NM – 76%, OK – 81%, RI – 74%, SD – 71%, UT – 70%, VT – 75%, WV – 81%, and WY – 69%; in Southern and border states: AR – 80%,, KY- 80%, MS – 77%, MO – 70%, NC – 74%, OK – 81%, SC – 71%, TN – 83%, VA – 74%, and WV – 81%; and in other states polled: CA – 70%, CT – 74%, MA – 73%, MN – 75%, NY – 79%, OR – 76%, and WA – 77%. Americans believe that the candidate who receives the most votes should get elected.
The bill has passed 31 state legislative chambers, in 21 small, medium-small, medium, and large states, including one house in AR, CT, DE, DC, ME, MI, NV, NM, NY, NC, and OR, and both houses in CA, CO, HI, IL, NJ, MD, MA, RI, VT, and WA. The bill has been enacted by DC (3), HI (4), IL (19), NJ (14), MD (11), MA (10), CA (55), VT (3), and WA (13). These 9 jurisdictions possess 132 electoral votes — 49% of the 270 necessary to bring the law into effect.
http://www.NationalPopularVote.com
Wow, someone has learned to cut and paste; I’m sure we’re all very impressed. Again, at the Save Our States website (which I will not cut and paste here out of courtesy), we’ve refuted the polling that NPV has paid for and all these silly claims that appear to so captivate the anonymous commenter above (another NPV lobbyist/troll?). And I did substantiate my claim, I cited two authors, but obviously you’re more the type who needs to be spoon fed.
Wow, 2! That’s very impressive.
Clearly we all must take those 2 individuals as representative of all of “the most honest supporters of National Popular Vote”, despite the authors of “Every Vote Equal,” clearly the most honest supporters of National Popular Vote, which I quoted, clearly concluding:
“In short, enactment of the National Popular Vote compact has no bearing on the federal constitutional provisions establishing equal representation of the states in the U.S. Senate.”
How do you discredit the Gallup polls since 1944? In them only about 20% of the public has supported the current system of awarding all of a state’s electoral votes to the presidential candidate who receives the most votes in each separate state (with about 70% opposed and about 10% undecided). And how do you discredit the recent Washington Post, Kaiser Family Foundation, and Harvard University poll that showed 72% support for direct nationwide election of the President? None of these were paid for by National Popular Vote.
In no polling I know of, have supporters of National Popular Vote, self-identified or otherwise as being among the most honest supporters, been asked if they also support eliminating the U.S. Senate, to allow you to have any factual data with which to make your claim.
I do not count those whose objective is to pass NPV as among its most honest proponents. (Including the authors of their self-published book, a work that is as intellectually shallow as it is long.) It is not in their interest to talk about any of the motivations for or ramifications of NPV that do not help them win over state legislators. That’s fine–it’s called lobbying–but it’s certainly not the whole story. The argument that the Electoral College is undemocratic applies even more so to the U.S. Senate–if you think it doesn’t, I’m sure we’d all love to hear your explanation….