Adopted 10/08/2011
by Constitution Party National Committee
Coeur d’Alene, Idaho
Whereas, the Electoral College represents the inspired genius of our Founding Fathers as brought forth in the United States Constitution, and
Whereas, the Electoral College was designed to ensure the efficient and peaceful transfer of power; and
Whereas, the so-called National Popular Vote is a dangerous threat to our Constitutional Republic, allowing as few as eleven states to circumvent the Constitutional requirement of 38 states to amend the Constitution; and
Whereas, the National Popular Vote creates a fake majority by forcing electors to vote against the votes cast by their own constituents; and
Whereas, the elimination of the Electoral College would overnight make irrelevant the votes of Americans in about 25 states because candidates would only be interested in campaigning in large population states making small states meaningless zeros; and
Whereas, there is no threshold of what constitutes a “majority” under National Popular Vote. Therefore a presidential candidate could be elected with as little as 15% of the popular vote; and
Whereas, under the National Popular Vote scheme chaos would ensue in any close election; and
Whereas, under the Electoral College no single faction or region of the country can elect a president ensuring broad representation across America; Therefore, be it
Resolved, That the Constitution Party opposes the National Popular Vote and will work to defeat it in individual state legislatures; Be it further
Resolved that the National Constitution Party will work to preserve the Electoral College.
Now I know I was dead wrong. The power outage here in New York prevented me from saying so before this, but it also gave me time to read a book I have on the subject. I believed that there was a fundamental difference between the conduct of the first few presidential elections and those conducted after the 12th “Electoral College” amendment.
I was dead wrong. My bad.
Thank You, there is soooooooooooo much steer manure going on in governance. In poilitics, the bigs are surly responsible for much of the organized confusion.
Non Dems and non GOP need to be vigilant in be exact and factual.
Unfortunately the anti duopoly establishment forces stumbles and bumbles on a regular basis.
I once had the sad task of answering the rantings and ravings of an activist in the Veterans Party.
While his major theme was that the secular Vets Party had a duty to declare Jesus Christ as king of the Universe, he got around to asking how many of the House candidates would be elected in the next voting.
When no one stepped forward, I quietly told him: ALL OF THEM, Duh!
The on going ignorance, or thought ful decietfulness [Cody Quirk], or agents provacateur, in the alternative political scene is just sad ——– and hopefully will become less and less in the teens ………….
http://www.usconstitution.net/const.html#A2Sec1
The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America. He shall hold his Office during the Term of four Years, and, together with the Vice-President chosen for the same Term, be elected, as follows:
Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or Person holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United States, shall be appointed an Elector.
(The Electors shall meet in their respective States, and vote by Ballot for two persons, of whom one at least shall not lie an Inhabitant of the same State with themselves. And they shall make a List of all the Persons voted for, and of the Number of Votes for each; which List they shall sign and certify, and transmit sealed to the Seat of the Government of the United States, directed to the President of the Senate. The President of the Senate shall, in the Presence of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the Certificates, and the Votes shall then be counted. The Person having the greatest Number of Votes shall be the President, if such Number be a Majority of the whole Number of Electors appointed; and if there be more than one who have such Majority, and have an equal Number of Votes, then the House of Representatives shall immediately chuse by Ballot one of them for President; and if no Person have a Majority, then from the five highest on the List the said House shall in like Manner chuse the President. But in chusing the President, the Votes shall be taken by States, the Representation from each State having one Vote; a quorum for this Purpose shall consist of a Member or Members from two-thirds of the States, and a Majority of all the States shall be necessary to a Choice. In every Case, after the Choice of the President, the Person having the greatest Number of Votes of the Electors shall be the Vice President. But if there should remain two or more who have equal Votes, the Senate shall chuse from them by Ballot the Vice-President.) (This clause in parentheses was superseded by the 12th Amendment.)
The Congress may determine the Time of chusing the Electors, and the Day on which they shall give their Votes; which Day shall be the same throughout the United States.
…..
Amendment 12 – Choosing the President, Vice-President. Ratified 6/15/1804.
The Electors shall meet in their respective states, and vote by ballot for President and Vice-President, one of whom, at least, shall not be an inhabitant of the same state with themselves; they shall name in their ballots the person voted for as President, and in distinct ballots the person voted for as Vice-President, and they shall make distinct lists of all persons voted for as President, and of all persons voted for as Vice-President and of the number of votes for each, which lists they shall sign and certify, and transmit sealed to the seat of the government of the United States, directed to the President of the Senate;
The President of the Senate shall, in the presence of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the certificates and the votes shall then be counted;
The person having the greatest Number of votes for President, shall be the President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of Electors appointed; and if no person have such majority, then from the persons having the highest numbers not exceeding three on the list of those voted for as President, the House of Representatives shall choose immediately, by ballot, the President. But in choosing the President, the votes shall be taken by states, the representation from each state having one vote; a quorum for this purpose shall consist of a member or members from two-thirds of the states, and a majority of all the states shall be necessary to a choice. And if the House of Representatives shall not choose a President whenever the right of choice shall devolve upon them, before the fourth day of March next following, then the Vice-President shall act as President, as in the case of the death or other constitutional disability of the President.
The person having the greatest number of votes as Vice-President, shall be the Vice-President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of Electors appointed, and if no person have a majority, then from the two highest numbers on the list, the Senate shall choose the Vice-President; a quorum for the purpose shall consist of two-thirds of the whole number of Senators, and a majority of the whole number shall be necessary to a choice. But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States.
The so-called “Founding Fathers” didn’t create anything called an “Electoral College”! The President and Vice-President were elected by the Congress!
Good discussion of this in the comments at http://www.ballot-access.org/2011/10/27/elliot-ackerman-americans-elect-leader-publishes-criticism-of-electoral-college/#comments
Richard,
What about the House of Representative. In 1960’s Election as I recall Nixon got more the
the most votes for President, because of the voting in Alabama. If that be the case we could have Nixon as President of the United States from 1961 to 1969.
Don’t you think that it is a good Idea to send it
to the House of Representatives in 2012?
Sincerely, Mark Seidenberg,
Chairman, American Independent Party
@ 22… who is Britani? Britani Spears?
Catholic Trotskyist good point!
The Founding Fathers were a bunch of slave-owning terrorist war criminals. We would have been better off without the Revolution; Britain, despite being less religious, is still a better democracy because of its parliamentary system. The states are not people; therefore their rights do not matter; just like the rights of corporation does not matter. Glory unto the people! Rule Britani!
The Congress can vote to defund any or all extra-constitutional use of the military, however they will never do so. Additionally, thanks to the War Powers Act, the President can essentially send troops anywhere, any time for any reason and is not accountable to the Congress for a minimum of 60 days. Or in the case of Libya – not at all.
PS
National Guard does not equal militia, no matter how much anyone tries to say that it does!
I think you are missing the point abt this section of the Constitution. This is the actual way it is meant:
“and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States…”
This doesn’t refer to when the President is constitutionally Copmmander in Chief. The President is clearly defined as Commander in Chief. Declaring war is a seperate constitutional element from their status as Commander in Chief.
From Federalist 69:
First. The President will have only the occasional command of such part of the militia of the nation as by legislative provision may be called into the actual service of the Union. The king of Great Britain and the governor of New York have at all times the entire command of all the militia within their several jurisdictions. In this article, therefore, the power of the President would be inferior to that of either the monarch or the governor.
Secondly. The President is to be commander-in-chief of the army and navy of the United States. In this respect his authority would be nominally the same with that of the king of Great Britain, but in substance much inferior to it. It would amount to nothing more than the supreme command and direction of the military and naval forces, as first General and admiral of the Confederacy; while that of the British king extends to the DECLARING of war and to the RAISING and REGULATING of fleets and armies, all which, by the Constitution under consideration, would appertain to the legislature.1 The governor of New York, on the other hand, is by the constitution of the State vested only with the command of its militia and navy. But the constitutions of several of the States expressly declare their governors to be commanders-in-chief, as well of the army as navy; and it may well be a question, whether those of New Hampshire and Massachusetts, in particular, do not, in this instance, confer larger powers upon their respective governors, than could be claimed by a President of the United States.
“when called into the actual Service of the United States…” – which means by congressional declaration.
U.S. Constitution – Article 2 Section 2
The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States…
“he is not Commander In Chief unless Congress officially declares war”
That’s total nonsense. The Constitution is entirely clear on this point.
As far as the National Popular Vote plan, it just swings the pendulum from one extreme past the mean to another extreme. The root problem of all this is not the Electoral College itself, but rather the semi-unknown slates of electors and the winner take all scheme. Our Founders envisioned that we would actually KNOW or know of our presidential electors. They were to be people prominent in the community of known character and views. Statewide winner take all slates are not community. Community is having district elections.
Maine and Nebraska already have district elections and have done so for many years. The logical next step is to print the actual names of the Electors themselves on the ballot instead of the semi-secret slate. This just adds two more names per party to the ballot and would not make it crowded. What’s the big deal?
With both the current system and National Popular Vote, all counting, recounting, and judicial proceedings must be conducted so as to reach a “final determination” prior to the common nationwide date (mid-December) for the meeting of the Electoral College.
The electors are dedicated party activists of the winning party who meet briefly in mid-December to cast their totally predictable votes in accordance with their pre-announced pledges.
If a Democratic presidential candidate receives the most votes, the state’s dedicated Democratic party activists who have been chosen as its slate of electors become the Electoral College voting bloc. If a Republican presidential candidate receives the most votes, the state’s dedicated Republican party activists who have been chosen as its slate of electors become the Electoral College voting bloc. The winner of the presidential election is the candidate who collects 270 votes from Electoral College voters from among the winning party’s dedicated activists.
Based on the current mix of states that have enacted the National Popular Vote compact, it will take about 25 states to reach the 270 electoral votes needed to activate the compact.
The Electoral College is the set of electors who vote for presidential candidates. In the current presidential election system, 48 states award all of their electors to the winners of their state.
The Founding Fathers in the Constitution did not require states to allow their citizens to vote for president, much less award all their electoral votes based upon the vote of their citizens.
The presidential election system we have today is not in the Constitution, and enacting National Popular Vote would not need an amendment. State-by-state winner-take-all laws to award Electoral College votes, are an example of state laws eventually enacted by states, using their exclusive power to do so, AFTER the Founding Fathers wrote the Constitution, Now our current system can be changed by state laws again.
Unable to agree on any particular method, the Founding Fathers left 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.”
The constitution does not prohibit any of the methods that were debated and rejected. Indeed, a majority of the states appointed their presidential electors using two of the rejected methods in the nation’s first presidential election in 1789 (i.e., appointment by the legislature and by the governor and his cabinet). Presidential electors were appointed by state legislatures for almost a century.
Neither of the two most important features of the current system of electing the President (namely, universal suffrage, and the 48 state-by-state winner-take-all method) are in the U.S. Constitution. Neither was the choice of the Founders when they went back to their states to organize the nation’s first presidential election.
In 1789, in the nation’s first election, the people had no vote for President in most states, only men who owned a substantial amount of property could vote, and only three states used the state-by-state winner-take-all method to award electoral votes.
The current 48 state-by-state winner-take-all method (i.e., awarding all of a state’s electoral votes to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in a particular state) is not entitled to any special deference based on history or the historical meaning of the words in the U.S. Constitution. It is not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, the debates of the Constitutional Convention, or the Federalist Papers. The actions taken by the Founding Fathers make it clear that they never gave their imprimatur to the winner-take-all method.
The constitutional wording does not encourage, discourage, require, or prohibit the use of any particular method for awarding the state’s electoral votes.
As a result of changes in state laws enacted since 1789, the people have the right to vote for presidential electors in 100% of the states, there are no property requirements for voting in any state, and the state-by-state winner-take-all method is used by 48 of the 50 states. States can, and frequently have, changed their method of awarding electoral votes over the years. Maine and Nebraska do not use the winner-take-all method– a reminder that an amendment to the U.S. Constitution is not required to change the way the President is elected.
The normal process of effecting change in the method of electing the President is specified in the U.S. Constitution, namely action by the state legislatures. This is how the current system was created, and this is the built-in method that the Constitution provides for making changes.
Sorry to burst all of your bubbles, but the President is not the president of the people. He is the chief executive officer simply presiding over the executive branch of one third of the federal government with the additional duty of representing our federation of states at the international level. Additionally, he is not Commander In Chief unless Congress officially declares war, which they haven’t since 1941 so cut it out with the silly song.
The president has absolutely no authority over We The People. We are not his subjects nor are we his constituents and thus we do not elect him directly.
Over the years, far too much pomp and circumstance has been inappropriately lauded to this office. If you wand celebrity, watch Dancing With The Stars.
In the current system, it could only take winning the plurality of the vote in the 11 most populous states, containing 56% of the population of the United States, for a candidate to win with a mere 26% of the nation’s votes.
With National Popular Vote, big states that are just about as closely divided as the rest of the country, would not get all of the candidates’ attention. In recent presidential elections, the 11 largest states have been split — five “red states (Texas, Florida, Ohio, North Carolina, and Georgia) and six “blue” states (California, New York, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and New Jersey). Among the four largest states, the two largest Republican states (Texas and Florida) generated a total margin of 2.1 million votes for Bush, while the two largest Democratic states generated a total margin of 2.1 million votes for Kerry. 8 small western states, with less than a third of California’s population, provided Bush with a bigger margin (1,283,076) than California provided Kerry (1,235,659).
If an Electoral College type of arrangement were essential for avoiding a proliferation of candidates and people being elected with low percentages of the vote, we should see evidence of these conjectured apocalyptic outcomes in elections that do not employ such an arrangement. In elections in which the winner is the candidate receiving the most votes throughout the entire jurisdiction served by that office, historical evidence shows that there is no massive proliferation of third-party candidates and candidates do not win with small percentages. For example, in 905 elections for governor in the last 60 years, the winning candidate received more than 50% of the vote in over 91% of the elections. The winning candidate received more than 45% of the vote in 98% of the elections. The winning candidate received more than 40% of the vote in 99% of the elections. No winning candidate received less than 35% of the popular vote.
Since 1824 there have been 16 presidential elections in which a candidate was elected or reelected without gaining a majority of the popular vote.– including Lincoln (1860), Wilson (1912, and 1916), Truman (1948), Kennedy (1960), Nixon (1968), and Clinton (1992 and 1996).
If the National Popular Vote bill were to become law, it would not change the need for candidates to build a winning coalition across demographics. Any candidate who yielded, for example, the 16% of Americans who live in rural areas in favor of a “big city” approach would not likely win the national popular vote. Candidates would still have to appeal to a broad range of demographics, and perhaps even more so, because the election wouldn’t be capable of coming down to just one demographic, such as voters in Ohio.
The National Popular Vote bill preserves the constitutionally mandated Electoral College and state control of elections. It changes the way electoral votes are awarded by states in the Electoral College, instead of the current 48 state-by-state winner-take-all system. 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 every presidential election. Every vote would be included in the national count. The candidate with the most popular votes in all 50 states and DC 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 and DC wins the presidency.
National Popular Vote would give a voice to the minority party voters in each state and district (in ME and NE). 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, every vote, everywhere would be counted equally 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 the current handful of swing states and less than 60 districts. The political reality would be that when every vote is equal, the campaign must be run in every part of the country.
In the 2012 election, pundits and campaign operatives already agree that, only 7-14 states and their voters will matter under the current winner-take-all laws (i.e., awarding all of a state’s electoral votes to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in each state) used by 48 of the 50 states. Candidates will not care about at least 72% of the voters– voters in 19 of the 22 lowest population and medium-small states, and in 16 medium and big states like CA, GA, NY, and TX. 2012 campaigning would be even more obscenely exclusive than 2008 and 2004. In 2008, candidates concentrated over 2/3rds of their campaign events and ad money in just 6 states, and 98% in just 15 states (CO, FL, IN, IA, MI, MN, MO, NV, NH, NM, NC, OH, PA, VA, and WI). Over half (57%) of the events were in just 4 states (OH, FL, PA, and VA). Candidates have no reason to poll, visit, advertise, organize, campaign, or care about the voter concerns in the dozens of states where they are safely ahead or hopelessly behind. More than 85 million voters have been just spectators to the general election.
Now with state-by-state winner-take-all laws, presidential elections ignore 12 of the 13 lowest population states (3-4 electoral votes), that are almost invariably non-competitive,in presidential elections. Six regularly vote Republican (Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota, and South Dakota), and six regularly vote Democratic (Rhode Island, Delaware, Hawaii, Vermont, Maine, and DC) in presidential elections.
Support for a national popular vote is strong in every smallest state surveyed in recent polls among Republicans, Democrats, and Independent voters, as well as every demographic group. Support in smaller states (3 to 5 electoral votes): Alaska — 70%, DC — 76%, Delaware –75%, Idaho – 77%, Maine — 77%, Montana – 72%, Nebraska — 74%, New Hampshire –69%, Nevada — 72%, New Mexico — 76%, Rhode Island — 74%, South Dakota – 71%, Utah – 70%, Vermont — 75%, West Virginia – 81%, and Wyoming – 69%.
In the lowest population states, the National Popular Vote bill has passed in nine state legislative chambers — including one house in DC, Delaware, Maine, and both houses in Hawaii, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It has been enacted by the District of Columbia, Hawaii, and Vermont.
Now, policies important to the citizens of ‘flyover’ states – that include 9 of the original 13 states – are not as highly prioritized as policies important to ‘battleground’ states when it comes to governing, too.
Oops, I see we were both speed reading…
It might be even better to get rid of the presidency and move to a parliamentary system where all parties are represented in Congress on a proportional percent of the nationwide vote. Get rid of congressional districts and states, and make the leader of the majority coalition in the House the national chief executive.
Um, reader, from where did you deduce my position?
To put it quite simply, you are wrong about where I stand on this, as you could have found out from many comments I have made at IPR and BAN.
strike all references to paulie. it’s the lowercase p.
Little surprise that Winger & paulie support the anti-American Communist-inspired mobacracy…
the Shocker is that Phillies has the decent position on something.
I second Richard’ motions, all of them.
I am sorry to see that the Constitution Party has taken this position. If the National Popular Vote Plan came close to getting enough states to go into effect, I believe at that point the nation’s state legislatures and Congress would simply pass a constitutional amendment to have a direct popular election for President. Every other nation with a popular-elected President has a direct popular vote. All U.S. states have a direct popular vote to elect Governors. If the U.S. were starting from scratch, no one would propose the system we have now.
If we had a direct popular vote, there would need to be a uniform method for presidential candidates to get on the ballot, and I believe it would be far superior to the mess we have now, in which states legislatures like those in Oklahoma, Texas, Indiana, North Carolina and Georgia have the authority to prevent the voters in their states from having a real choice for president in November.
Don’t forget, Ron Paul has introduced the ballot access bill in Congress more than any other member of Congress, and it sets a national standard for getting on the ballot for federal office. We should all support a national standard for getting on the ballot for President.
I concur.
They got one thing right. Good work, guys!