The Hill is reporting that outgoing Democrat senator Barbara Boxer will introduce legislation to get rid of the Electoral College.
Boxer’s quest is so quixotic that not even Don Quixote himself would pursue it.
Why?
Because . . .
. . . what Boxer wants is fraught with problems as the USA Today editorial board mentions in its editorial “Keep the Electoral College”.
. . . being that the USA is a nation of states, the states decide who will be the POTUS. The Electoral College levels the playing field for the states. An elimination of the Electoral College would result in the disenfranchisement of the individual states. A New Hampshire Union Leader editorial states, “The Electoral College ensures that small states, and rural areas in large states, are not completely ignored in presidential campaigns. Replacing the Electoral College with a national referendum would turn most of America into Flyover Country.”
. . . 3/4th of the states have to ratify any constitutional amendment in order for it to take effect. Even a Democrat should figure out that 3/4 of the states won’t relinquish a right belonging to each state.
. . . the USA Today editorial board says it best: “The way to win is to run better campaigns and better candidates under the existing rules, not try to change the rules after a painful loss.”
In a commentary for the Wall Street Journal, Hillsdale College president Larry P. Arnn explains the reason for the Electoral College:
“The Constitution is paradoxical most of all about power, which it grants and withholds, bestows and limits, aggregates and divides, liberates and restrains. Elections are staggered, so as to distribute them across time. The founding document also divides power across space; the people grant a share of their natural authority to the federal government, but another share to the states where they live.
This innovation is most directly responsible for the greatness of the United States. Think what the Founders achieved: They invented a way of governing, and they extended it without benefit of kings or colonies across a vast continent, bigger than they could imagine, until they got to the other side 30 years later. The magnificent Northwest Ordinance granted free government to the territories, then representative and independent state government thereafter. Ruled from Washington, the nation could never have settled this land in freedom nor made it so strong.
The practical political equality that the American people have achieved depends entirely upon their ability to spread political authority across a vast area. In American political life, it matters how many people are in favor of a given thing. It also matters where they live.
Mr. Trump joins John Quincy Adams, Rutherford B. Hayes, Benjamin Harrison and George W. Bush as the only presidents who won without the popular vote. After 2000, this is the second time in recent years — a product of the deep and wide division in America between the urban and the rural, the sophisticated and the rustic, the cosmopolitan and the local.
It is a shame that the winner this year, Mr. Trump, lost the popular vote by a whisker. But it would be as much or more a shame if Mrs. Clinton had prevailed despite massively losing the geographic vote, the vote across space, the vote that reflects the different ways that Americans live.
We forget that it is a historical rarity to have an executive strong enough to do the job but still responsible to the people he governs. The laws in the U.S. have worked that miracle for longer than anywhere else. Remember that the Electoral College helps establish the ground upon which the American people must talk with each other, while ensuring that they are not ruled as colonies from a bunch of blue capitals, nor from a bunch of red ones.”
This talk about eliminating the Electoral College is nonsense. As that New Hampshire Union Leader editorial says, “There have been some longtime critics of the Electoral College, but the newfound fervor to replace it is mostly sour grapes.”
Barack Obama was elected POTUS twice via the Electoral College. The same also goes for Bill Clinton.
The Electoral College didn’t prevent Hillary Clinton from winning on 11/8/16. Hillary Clinton prevented Hillary Clinton from winning on 11/8/16.
If Democrats are going to whine about the Electoral College, then they need to include cheese with their meals.
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