The movement to change the Presidential Election process from the Electoral College system that has allowed five Presidential elections to be won by the national popular vote loser, has made more progress in the past few days, with Minnesota becoming the 16th state plus the District of Columbia to agree to the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact!
Five Presidential Elections have seen the “vote of the people” denied with the popular vote loser becoming President as follows:
1824 Andrew Jackson loses to John Quincy Adams despite 38,000 vote lead
1876 Samuel Tilden loses to Rutherford B. Hayes despite 252,000 vote lead
1888 Grover Cleveland loses to Benjamin Harrison despite 90,000 vote lead
2000 Al Gore loses to George W. Bush despite 540,000 vote lead
2016 Hillary Clinton loses to Donald Trump despite 2.86 million vote lead
The total number of electoral votes needed to win the Presidency is 270, with the 16 states and DC adding up to a total of 205 electoral votes.
The problem is in a divided America all of the states and DC that have agreed to the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact are “blue” states.
In order of their adoption by the state legislatures and signing by the governors are the following states: (starting in April 2007 until May 2023)
Maryland
New Jersey
Illinois
Hawaii
Washington
Massachusetts
District of Columbia
Vermont
California
Rhode Island
New York
Connecticut
Colorado
Delaware
New Mexico
Oregon
Minnesota
Two states–Maine and Nevada–passed the compact, but in Maine, a followup required vote failed and in Nevada the Republican governor vetoed the legislation. But in the past two weeks, Nevada passed the legislation again, and it seems almost ready to add its six electoral votes to the total, making it, when it happens, 211 electoral votes.
Six other states saw one of the houses of the state legislature pass the bill–Arizona (11), Arkansas (6), Michigan (15), North Carolina (16), Oklahoma (7), and Virginia (13). If these six states were to pass such a bill in the future, it would mean 68 more electoral votes, which with the present 205, would add up to 273, three more than needed, and if Nevada joined the list, it would be 279!
But even if more states were to join this compact, it is likely that there would be a constitutional challenge if, in a future Presidential election, this compact came into reality, and it could cause a major division in the nation.
This is promising good news. I am proud of my State of Maryland.
Let’s hope the other States see the vision to truly have a Democracy in our country.
This posting had me remembering the “Collective Wisdom” Theory.
“Collective Wisdom” as an example, is when one asks a large enough number of people to guess the number of jelly beans in a jar. Then you total up the guesses, then duvide by two, to come up with the averaged answer.
This average answer is likely to be very close to the correct number.
The sumation lesson here is, “The crowd is smarter than any individual.”
“Collective Wisdom” is put to good use to tackle many kinds of problems, and complexities.
A debt ceiling deal has been reached.
https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/27/politics/whats-in-the-debt-ceiling-deal/index.html
If anyone is watching The 2010s on CNN, next week’s episode has been bumped up to tonight at 9 pm EST because Nikki Haley is having her CNN town hall next week.