Nevada set to join NPVIC (UPDATE: vetoed by idiot governor)

[SteveRogers]

So far the only argument against NPVIC on this thread is "Democrats just want to win election more/easier".    Which is extremely weak.   It doesn't address the actual issues behind the EC/popular vote whatsoever.

My argument is actually that is all secretly Democrats want, because they either don't understand what the EC is for or don't understand what a republic is.

They know what a republic is. They want the country to be more democratic and less of a republic.

The Electoral College has no relation to being a Republic.   If it did then I believe the United States is one of the extreme few "Republics" on Earth.

I (and I believe he) mean republic in this sense:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republic#United_States

The electoral college is a step away from pure democracy to indirect control.

Yes, the United States is a representative democracy. No, an electoral college is not a requisite characteristic of a republic. There are plenty of other republics. No one else has an electoral college.

Even if indirect election for indirect election’s sake was a positive ideal to strive for, the current electoral college doesn’t fulfill that goal. The founders intended for the electors to be a group of wise men who would meet and deliberate to elect a president. And yes, the purpose was to insulate the presidency from the will of the masses. The current electoral college bears little resemblance to that system. Instead, it is a silly math game that merely arbitrarily changes which segments of the public presidential candidates need to appeal to.

[SteveRogers]

Here's the overlooked argument: there does not exist one national presidential election run by the federal government every fourth November. There exist fifty-one presidential elections run by the states and DC independently, each with their own laws concerning voting rights and ballot access. The slate of candidates is not uniform across states, nor is franchise uniformly distributed. There have been elections where not all of the major party candidates are allowed on the ballot in each state (e.g. Alabama 1964). If states can remove major candidates, they can, if large enough, single-handledly decide the popular vote by themselves. We would need an amendment federalizing the administration of presidential elections in order to ensure the national popular vote is anything but an easily-rigged farce.

We are aware. Any change to a national popular vote should be accompanied by uniform federal regulations governing said presidential election. (I actually do think this is a major shortcoming of the NPVIC. My hope would be that if the NPVIC movement picks up steam, it will lead to momentum for a proper constitutional amendment).

[SteveRogers]

I really don't see why people think scrapping the EC is an outrageous idea... it's clearly an outdated system that was originally intended to keep the interests of white rich landowning guys in the WH....

Fine since this is most people's beef with the EC...here's my compromise: The presidential winner is the one who wins the popular majority...of the most states.  No EC numbers, no delegates.

You just to win the popular majority in 26 or more of the 50 states.  And looking back at the last few elections, we would've had the same winners each time.

But no you won't like that, because Wyoming would be the most powerful and the masses in Cali wouldn't.  Well, that balances out what happens in the House, doesn't it?

The Senate balances out what happens in the House. The President is supposed to look after the interests of the American people as a whole, so why shouldn’t they be elected by the American people? And the “but California will control everything” schtick is a non-argument. Under a national popular vote, the strength of your vote wouldn’t depend on where you live. A voter in California would have just as much of a voice as a voter in Wyoming. Moreover, the millions of Republicans in California would have just as much of a say in the election as everyone else, as would the millions of Democrats in Texas.

[SteveRogers]

Also why should populous states get the edge in the House and less populous states not get an edge in the presidency.

Because the Senate already exists. That’s literally the whole reason why we have a bicameral legislature.

No states should have an edge in electing the executive of the whole country because pieces of land shouldn’t be electing the executive of the whole country, people should.

[SteveRogers]

The electoral college is an irrational anachronism.

The NPVIC is not the way to fix it. If we ever had an election where it would reverse the outcome in favor of the Democrat, whichever state in the compact voted Republican would drop the whole thing so fast it would make your head spin.

The National Popular Vote compact permits a state to withdraw; however, it delays the effective date of a withdrawal until after the inauguration of the new President if the withdrawal occurs during the six-month period between July 20 of a presidential election year and Inauguration Day.

https://www.nationalpopularvote.com/section_9.11

The NPVIC itself wouldn’t be able to stop a state from withdrawing from the compact after Election Day. Whatever the compact itself says about the withdrawal date, the state legislature could just repeal that law.

However, while there would definitely be a court battle in such a scenario, constitutionally I don’t  think a state could change the rules after the election has already occurred. While the states have discretion in deciding how to assign their electors, the Constitution gives congress the authority to set the day for the choosing of the electors, and currently that date is the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November. The states can’t change their mind about which slate of electors was chosen after the fact.