Editor,
This letter is in response to the proposed ballot initiative that will end the winner-takes-all apportionment of California's large number of Electoral College votes.
The framers of the U.S. Constitution created the Electoral College as a result of a compromise for the presidential election process. During the debate, some delegates felt that a direct popular election would lead to the election of each state's favorite son, and none would emerge with sufficient popular majority to govern the country. Other delegates felt that giving Congress the power to select the president would deny the people their right to choose. After all, the people voted for their representatives to the Legislature. The compromise was to set up an Electoral College system that allowed voters to vote for electors, who would then cast their votes for candidates.
Each state is allocated a number of electors equal to the number of its senators - two for each state - plus the number of its representatives, which may change each decade according to the size of each state's population.
Whichever party slate wins the target number of popular votes becomes that state's electors. In effect, whichever presidential ticket gets the most popular votes in a state wins all the electors of that state.
The debate has again started on whether the Constitution should be amended to change the presidential election process. Some promote eliminating the Electoral College in favor of a direct popular vote for president, while others believe it should remain unchanged. The solution is to change the electoral votes to electoral points and reward each candidate a percentage of points based on the percentage of popular votes received in each state. This would eliminate the winner-take-all system, thus allowing for all the votes to count. A voter is more apt to believe his or her vote counted when a percentage of popular votes are taken into account, rather than the all-or-nothing system currently in existence.
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This new system would integrate the desire for a popular vote for president with the need for the individual states to determine who actually gets elected. I believe this reflects the will of the people as exercised through their states. It would also prevent the smaller red and blue states from being ignored in favor of the larger states.
Joe Bialek
Daily Lobo reader
