Challenging the Electoral College's winner take all system in Massachusetts

[DonViejo]

By Michael Levenson GLOBE STAFF AUGUST 10, 2018

A Harvard Law professor, former governor William F. Weld, and Al Gore’s onetime attorney are making a long-shot bid to change the Electoral College system, arguing that it encourages presidential candidates to devote all their time to a handful of swing states and ignore the vast majority of the country.

The high-powered group is suing two blue states, Massachusetts and California, and two red states, Texas and South Carolina, arguing that the winner-take-all system that they and 44 other states use to allocate electors to the Electoral College effectively disenfranchises millions of voters who back the losing candidates.

In 2016, for example, more than 1 million Massachusetts voters cast ballots for Donald Trump, but that translated into zero Electoral College votes because Massachusetts’ winner-take-all system required all 11 of the state’s electoral votes to go to Hillary Clinton. Similarly in Texas, nearly 4 million voters cast ballots for Clinton, but all 38 of the state’s Electoral College votes went to Trump.

The group contends that the winner-take-all system violates the “one person, one vote” principle because voters who back losing candidates in the general election in November have their votes “discarded when it really counts in mid-December,” and the Electoral College picks the president.

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https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2018/08/09/william-weld-challenges-electoral-college-winner-take-all-system-massachusetts/3MpDZk90evXOcsDxC1WNAP/story.html

[former9thward]

1. The Constitution is the highest law of the land.

The Constitution can't be unconstitutional. This is a silly publicity seeking lawsuit.

[unblock]

2. political stunt. there's absolutely zero legal argument for this.

voters are not being denied "one person one vote" because voters are not voting for president at all! the constitution does not provide for direct election of the president by the voters. instead, voters in each state may vote (even that is subject to each state's choosing) for that state's electors to the electoral college.

states could deny a vote altogether and simply appoint the electors. that would be wildly unpopular, but perfectly constitutional.

and there's nothing in the constitution that says the slate of electors can't be voted on as a bloc. again, the constitution gives each state the right to choose the method of selecting electors.


all that said, i hope they get some media attention and they can generate some political opposition to the electoral college. it needs to be changed. i just don't have any hope for a solution arising out of a lawsuit....

[brooklynite]

3. Back to Civics class...

You have no CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHT to vote for President. All the Constitution says is that each State allocates it's Electoral College votes as it sees fit.

[Phoenix61]

4. Awesome!

Nebraska and Maine already split their electoral college votes.

[Blue_true]

6. WRONG IDEA.

You are right about Maine and Nebraska. But the most recent efforts are being pushed by the right to blunt the influence of reliably blue states during a presidential election. They would be perfectly if red states stayed as is, or gerrymandered so that there were few to no blue electoral votes.

The President should be selected by nationwide popular vote, that gives big population areas just representation in the selection.

[seaglass]

5. I would be in favor of this IF electors were distributed fairly and proportionately according to

population. Until then, no.

Also I am from MA and do not require that a presidential candidate come to my state in order to vote for her/him. That's just dumb.