Only Winning Matters?

The United States was politically configured almost two and half centuries ago, a time of slavery and flintlocks. When we relied primarily on an unpaid citizen militia, and farming was our mainstay industry. What are short distances today among the 13 original colonies would have taken days, if not longer, to reach the capital. Farm states, with their population diluted by vast tracks of farmland, were suspicious of city slickers, where concentrations of a lot of voters were crammed into smaller spaces. The Electoral College, where electors, not the direct vote of the citizens, cast the final ballots for president and vice-president. They were selected as trusted local surrogates for voters, avoiding a constant litany of long trips “back home” to re-ask voters what they want in the event the voting situational changes.

The United States is the oldest contiguous democracy on earth with the least amendable constitution among any modern democracy. It is virtually impossible to amend the Constitution given the requirements, particularly today where polarization rules, which is reflected in the last rather innocuous amendment – the 27^th which limited Congress’ right to give itself a raise – that took 203 years from being introduced to passage in 1992.

All of the above factors led the United States, way back “then,” to adopt what is known as the New Jersey Compromise, where land and voting districts were gave a distinctly heavier weight to agricultural states with smaller populations over cities with greater concentrations of voters. Hence, today, California with a population of 40 million has the same number of Senators – two, elected every six years – as Wyoming with 500 thousand voters. Note the impact of such a skew in a Senate trial to remove an impeached president. The House of Representatives (elected for two years), often based on legislatively biased gerrymandered voting districts enhanced by voter restrictions to minimize the power of the opposing party, is supposed to represent the relative populations (vs land mass).

Indeed, as Citizens United has influenced primaries to push political parties to extremes – same-party candidates square off touting how much more conservative or liberal they are than their opponents – the resulting polarization has decimated Congress’ ability to compromise or even act in the best interests of the people in general. Even the Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell, who signed an oath of impartiality in the approaching Senate trial of Donald J Trump, has openly stated that he would not remotely be impartial. He is placing pressure on Republicans to close ranks to deny Trump’s removal, and he publicly stated that he would be in close coordination with defendant Trump and his legal team. A number GOP Senators have already pledged to follow McConnell’s lead.

The Republican Party has a deep set of problems, despite their domination of both the US Senate and a majority of state governorships and legislatures. Their core constituency is growing older and decreasingly relevant in terms of sheer numbers. The United States is rapidly becoming a majority of racial and ethnic minorities that seems to threaten a number of white, Christian traditionalists that form the core of Trump’s base. And while GOP candidates cherish Donald Trump’s connection to an unmovable block of supporters, the base without which a majority of Republican elected officials could not win the next election, the message for an increasingly educated, younger rising electorate threatens to extinguish the Republican Party in the coming years. They may win in 2020, but they will slowly unravel thereafter… if the United States survives at all.

Saddled with unmanageable student dept while the rich continue to benefit from accelerating income inequality, unaffordable housing, the impact of job displacement from automation (artificial intelligence), the embarrassment of a mendacious president decimating US relations with other nations, igniting potential wars where the young might be required to fight… but most of all denying climate change despite irrefutable proof to the contrary, exacerbating the release of greenhouse gasses and environmental pollutants that will make living in the future vastly more unpleasant… the vast majority of younger voters are leaving and will continue to leave the GOP in droves. Those younger Trump supporters you see in rallies or at red state sporting events are a dying breed.

But the conundrum for the GOP is that if they court those younger voters, or those still too young to cast a ballot, they will lose their base. Some base-driven ultraconservative will blow them away at the next primary election. So, the GOP’s marching orders are to fight to maintain politically motivated gerrymanders (will the new right-leaning Supreme Court eliminate that?), voting restrictions that effectively deter or eliminate Democrat-supporting voters and political systems that tend to support them, like an outmoded Electoral College. Delay the inevitable and maybe we’ll figure out a new path in the future. The Electoral College remains an unnecessary middleman in a modern era, but one that clearly favors red states over blue. Electors generally cast their expected votes in the January when the President takes office, well after the November election. In the graphic above, Democrats won the popular vote in six out of the last seven presidential elections but won the presidency only four times. See anything wrong with this picture?

In 2016, one Colorado Democrat elector, Michael Baca, decided to cast a vote for GOP candidate, John Kasich, over his pledge to vote for Hillary Clinton. Colorado officials then removed him, discarded his vote and replaced him with an elector who cast her vote for Clinton. Baca sued. The “U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals last year that held that the electors established by the Constitution ‘have a right to make a choice’ when they vote for president… If the ruling stands, it could further transform the creaky electoral college system and inject a new element of suspense and surprise into presidential elections.

“Under the little-understood electoral college system, when Americans cast their votes for president on election day, they are actually choosing a slate of electors who will, in turn, cast the state’s votes the following January. Since the early 1800s, it has been understood that the chosen electors will cast their votes for the candidate who won the most votes in their state, making the January tally a mere formality… But if electors have a ‘constitutional right’ to pick someone else, the winner of a close presidential election could be in doubt for weeks after election day.

“Electors in most states are required to take an oath to support the winning candidate, and many states have laws stating that so-called faithless electors will be removed and replaced if they fail to abide by their commitment.” David G. Savage writing for the Los Angeles Times, January 18^th.

Enter Michael Baca. “Baca sued, alleging that his removal violated the Constitution, which says the ‘electors shall meet in their respective states and vote by ballot for president.’ He lost before a federal judge but won a 2-1 ruling in the 10th Circuit Court. The majority said the use of the terms ‘elector, vote and ballot have a common theme,’ indicating that ‘the electors, once appointed, are free to vote as they choose.’…

“The Supreme Court agreed Friday [1/17] to resolve an issue that could tip the outcome of very close presidential elections, and decide whether electors have a right to defy their state’s choice for president by voting for the candidate of their choice.” LA Times.

Despite the reality that the Electoral College system is an anachronism that has long-since outlived its purpose, since it clearly favors land-based voters (heavily GOP) in an era where urbanization now defines the country – where districts not popular votes are determinative – the likelihood of getting a constitutional amendment to go directly to a popular vote has absolutely no foreseeable chance of passage. OK, Supreme Court, are you truly an impartial and independent leader of our judicial system… or just a political functionary? The case is Colorado Department of State vs. Baca, and the court will also consider a similar case from Washington state, Chiafalo vs. Washington.

            I’m Peter Dekom, and increasingly old systems never intended to be used in political manipulation are threatening the very foundations of American democracy.