July 28, 2007

North Carolina to Adopt Awful Electoral College Reform

I'll never understand this idea. It's bad enough that we have the electoral college. But if we are going to keep it, history and federalism are really the only reasons to do so - which, it would seem to me, would call for letting the actual states keep their electoral college votes. Now if you want to represent voters and not states, fine - then what you should do (again, if we MUST keep the college) is award the electors proportionally based on how many votes they get from the people of each state. But this whole divide up electors by congressional district thing ... I ask you, why? It's not truly proportional. It's not holding up the tradition of the states. Congressional district boundaries are largely meaningless in terms of what they represent. They are made to elect particular members of Congress - so what's the connection to electing a president? Why should these amorphous shapes designed for parochial concerns shape who's elected to lead the country? And of course in the case of this state (and matters tied to the Voting Rights Act), you are quite possibly messing with a host of equal-rights issues as black voters are unusually highly concentrated in a small number of congressional districts. I get that the Democrats want a handful of votes in North Carolina - but it's a silly reform.

Posted by armand at July 28, 2007 11:15 AM | TrackBack | Posted to Politics


Comments

I agree. This is a horrible idea. What we should do is go to a direct national popular vote for President. There is a nationwide movement to accomplish just that. Maryland has already adopted the plan and identical legislation is in more than 40 states. I read about it in the NY Times. The organization has a website www.nationalpopularvote.com.

Posted by: Lars at July 29, 2007 03:15 AM | PERMALINK
Post a comment









Remember personal info?