A new consitutional argument why 2000 election was false.

[Perky]

It dawned on me today that under the voting rights act and under the principle of one man one vote, there is actually a pretty straight forwards argument as to why Al Gore should have been president and it has nothing to do with Florida or SCOTUS.

Wyoming's our smallest state with a population of 493,000.
Under a principle of OMOV every convressional district shoul approximate as much as possible this 493,000 number.


Instead it based on the 290M/435 or one per every 650k. Thats's how CA winds up with 52 in the house rather than 69 it should have based on an equal representation argument.

My though is that there is substanital dilution of voting strength in large states due to the arbrirary and unconstitutional limit of 435 Representative. There really should be 570 in the House.

Now taking that argument to the electoral college there should be 670 electors and 336 to win.

If you apply that math to the 2000 election. Gore wins. Ostensibly because he got more big states and this formulation dilutes the 2 from the senate somewhat.

Quick someone get me Larry Tribe's number.

Any thoughts?

[Redneck Socialist]

1. I agree that the House should be larger. n/t

[Perky]

3. The limitation to 435

orginiated in 1910.

I can't find any legal challenges on the web based on the dilution argument. Scotus would not reverse the result of an election... but the larger question is has it not been pursued because the Courst won't take it on becasue it would mean messing with the Sepaation of Powers issue. I would think that the right of the people to be equally treated trumps the right of Congress to regulate its size.

[papau]

2. Gore won under the rules in place - and despite the fraud

so why bother with any other arg.

but you are correct - the house should be 1/3 larger so as to get about 500000 citizens per seat.

[Sterling]

4. Yes the arguement we have is great 40k plus blacks purged...

Wrongfully, SCOTUS verdict that would not stand first year law school. Too bad no Dems with any power care to make anything of it. More than anything else it makes me wonder why I bother.

[lcordero]

14. I think that number might have been a lot closer to 90K

[Sterling]

18. Yes I think you are right but wanted to give the low estimate

All it would take to make a difference is 500-600 votes.

[JanMichael]

52. 97,700 with something like 96% of those wrongly purged.

It started with 57,700 in 1998 then was increased with 40,000 totally illegal purged names.

http://www.gregpalast.com/detail.cfm?artid=210&row=2

[sallyseven]

5. Do we really need more members of congress?

I don't think so.

[Perky]

8. Actually....I think we do.

If you read Article I of the consitution it is supposed to one rep for every 30,000 residents. that would the House should really be about 7,000 members.


I honestly thing howver cumbersom it might be,,,,,the smaller the constituency the more accountable the Rep. Plus with 7,000 reps it certainly takes influence-peddling down a new road. You have to wine and dine 3,500 reps to gain passage of your pet bill....haha

[Yupster]

31. That would be okay in 1810 when each House member

answered his own mail, but now, with each House member haveing a full staff and office budget, I don't want to pay for 7,000 House members and 150,000 congressional staffers.

[stevedeshazer]

34. That amount is minimal when compared to

the costs of war.

[Perky]

6. actually

its not 500,000 citizens. It is 500,000 residents.

[Perky]

56. That is a huge difference

Particulary in Southern California.

[grasswire]

7. write it up..

...and get it on the Internet in a short essay.

[Perky]

9. I thouth I just did that n/t

[Perky]

10. Gore wins 337 334

Wow still close as hell but a win is a win.

[pmbryant]

11. Unfortunately there's a big constitutional hole in this argument

The electoral college is written into the Constitution.

'One person one vote' is not written into the Constitution.

So constitutionally, this argument fails.

Democratically, however, it is spot on.

Under the principle of "one person one vote" and "whoever gets the most votes wins", Gore won. Unfortunately, as we saw, some people's vote counts more than others, some don't count at all, and if ever there's a dispute, the Supreme Court will just step in and do whatever they feel like, based on nothing but their own political preferences.

That's a pretty sad situation. But what's sadder is that so few people seem to care.

:-(

--Peter

[Perky]

13. Umm the 14th Amendment says differently

Section. 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

Section. 2. Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the Executive and Judicial officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State.



And the 19th Amendment ends the antiquation.

[pmbryant]

15. That only applies within individual states

There is nothing in the Constitution that says that a voter in Wyoming's vote for President must count the same as that as a voter from Texas, etc.

In fact, the way the Electoral College works as spelled out by the Constitution, these people's votes are forced to be worth different amounts.

--Peter

[Perky]

19. Are you kidding?

The Equal protection language has always been costrued to mean all law whetehr state or federal.

Besides

[pmbryant]

23. No

If we had 'one person one vote', Gore would be President based simply on the popular vote tally. After all he won by more than 500,000 votes.

When voting for President, thanks to the way the electoral college works, voters in some states have a far greater say in who becomes President than voters in other states. After the 2000 election, I thought we all got a pretty good demonstration of that. :-(

--Peter

[Perky]

26. hold it

Scotus applied the one man one vote standadrd in FL saying that all votes/voters had to be treated equally. If you recount one country you have to recount them all.

Despite the merits of their decision the priincipla of oneman one vote still suggest that people in large states on the House side of the Electoral ledger get shafter.. by this underreprentation of their voting strength.

[pmbryant]

27. Again, that only applied within that state

There is no Constitutional priciple of 'one person, one vote' that applies from one state to another. (If there were, the Electoral College would be unconsitutional.)

I agree that the principle of 'one person one vote' is a good one, and one that should be adopted in Presidential elections. But unfortunately, that is not what the Constitution says. It gives us this ludicrous electoral college system instead. :-(

--Peter

[Perky]

35. You really need to take a Con Law class

The equal protection clause of the constitution as it has been postulated agaian and again by the courts and validaated again and upheld again by the Voting Rights Act state that the rights of the citizento be equally protected by the Federal statute when it come to areas of federal concern (THe voting Rights Act) are fully within the domaing of the Federal courts.

It is the the federal constitution which mandates the elecotral college and it is the federal appprtionment act that determines how the representation in Congress is mandated. Its the Fereal lAw and the rules of COngress that are in question here.

My argument is that those two requirements do not meet the requirments of the Equal Protection clause.

If nothing else, congress Has abridged my right to free speech and equal representation

[pmbryant]

42. I think there's been a misunderstanding

(ON EDIT: I don't think I've misstated any facts, as I've purposefully kept my argument quite simple. I recognize my ignorance of the details. So I think you are misunderstanding what I was trying to say in my original response. A misunderstanding likely prompted by one of my own, it appears.)

Perhaps I misunderstood your reference to 'one man one vote', which I didn't realize you used to refer to the Equal Protection Clause, which is obviously part of the Constitution.

I thought of 'one person one vote' to mean that everyone's vote counts the same. And for President, that is clearly not the case, thanks to the electoral college, also part of the Constitution.

(So the Constitution contradicts itself, but unfortunately, the tie appears to be broken in favor of the electoral college in practice.)

Anyway, to go back to your original argument, the entire idea of Congressional representation in a fixed number of districts based on states technically violates the principle of 'one person one vote' (at least the way I think of it).

Even if you make the standard district size 490,000 (based on the population of Wyoming) instead of 650,000, there will be inequities. What about a state with a population of 700,000? Whether it gets one district or two, someone is getting shafted. If two districts, each holds only 350,000 people and these people get more representation than Wyoming residents. If one district, it holds 700,000 and these people get less representation than Wyoming residents.

Similar problems will exist whatever you make the standard size of a district, as far as I can tell, unless you have a huge number of total representatives. And even then, the inequities will remain, though they will be reduced. (We'd need at least ten times the current number of representatives, ideally even more!)

To make equal size districts across the country, you have to scrap state-by-state redistricting and have national redistricting, where district lines are free to cross state lines.

But as far as I know, the Constitution doesn't allow that. (Of course, if had taken a Con Law class, as I really need to, I would know this for sure instead of just making an educated guess. ;-) )

--Peter

[leyton]

49. We don't elect a president...

and nowhere in the Constitution does it say we do. Heck, in the days of the Founding Fathers, nobody ran national campaigns.

We choose electors to the Electoral college. And in those elections, which are held on a state-by-state basis, every person gets one vote.

[Perky]

50. But the point is...

That the Electoral College is based on the principle of the equality of the votes of the Electors.
We have already super-enfrachised smallstate by giving them two electors by virtue of them merely existing and a additional one by haveing a single inhabitant.

We should not dienfranchise larger states when we give Montana one elector for its 500,000 inhabitant and in the same breath give Califronia one elector for every 670,000.

The system is guarantted to dilute the voting strength of large population states. Both in the electoral college and in the House.

Ig you read the Federalist papers and you underst the birth of bicameralism, this is precisely what the Framers said was inappropriate.

The arfumen in my view is rock solid on a constitutional basis.

[Cleita]

12. Californians are way underepresented in the government.

As the fifth largest economy in the world, we aren't getting the say we should on how our tax money is being spent. It's really not fair.

[pmbryant]

16. Solution: split into multiple states

Say California splits into 5 states. Then you get 10 Senators, instead of a measly 2.

You could split into a lot more states than that and still have a lot more people in each of them than are in Wyoming, South Dakota, Delaware, etc.

:-)

Same applies to us here in Texas.

So how do we go about splitting up these big states? ;-)

--Peter

[Perky]

20. yikes

Can't be fedearlly mandated. And doon we would have mor Senators then reps.

I can See it now the Two senators for the state of North Birminham....No thanks.

[pmbryant]

24. Why is that worse than the current situation in the Senate?

It might even be better.

:shrug:

--Peter

[St. Jarvitude]

21. Now leaving Ca, entering Li

Now leaving Li, entering Fo
Now leaving Fo, entering Rn
Now leaving Rn, entering Ia

[graelent]

22. And Texas still has the option to split into 5 states

It was negotiated when we joined the Union, and has no expiration.

[HereSince1628]

28. Article IV sec 3 of the US Constitution provides all states such

a right.

New states (new territory), and even new states carved out of parts of other states or states may join to form one state so long as the legislatures of the states involved agree and Congress approves.

At least that's the way I read among the commas.

Though there may be other federal law that is imposed on implementing such a thing

[Yupster]

32. So when West Virginia was admitted in 1863,

was that legal?

[apsuman]

40. yes because...

"legal" thought (as I understand it) says that the states in rebellion are not part of the union, and are not recognized. So admitting West Virginia was like admitting any state carved out of the wilderness.

[Yupster]

51. I thought Lincoln's policy was

that the states never legally left the union, and were therefore still states?

[apsuman]

58. I never liked the answer

The way it was explained to me, never to my satisfaction -legal or logical, is basically, that the states in rebellion were states when we needed them to be and not states when we needed them for that.

A couple of points, Andrew Johnson, a senator from Tennessee, stayed in DC and continued to vote in the Senate. Now, if he were to have gone home, or died, or disappeared, the senate would never have a majority and would never be able to raise a quorum to do business, not even to change the rules to no longer need a quorum.

But, the homestead act passed during (or right after the war) allows people to stake out 160 acres, squat on it for five years and then file a deed with the local county claiming the land as yours. The Homestead act was used to give land away to anyone wanting to settle especially out west, but it applied everywhere. Well, I was told that the rebel states were ruled (by a judge I suppose) to not be in the union at the time and therefore exempt from the law.

As I said none of it ever made any sense to me.

But on a side note, if you formally secede - that is hole up in your farm house and issue your own declaration of independence, again as I understand it, the feds will come in with force. You have basically created a little notch of land devoid of federal civil rights. There was this kook in Idaho or somewhere about 15 years ago (way before Ruby Ridge) that did just that and the FBI just went in with force. Again it was explained to me that he basically gave up his USA civil rights. Just like a person that renonuces their citizenship.

Now, all of this - as I have pointed out - is as it was explained to me. Perhaps I should go google some of it... but not right now.

[Silverhair]

38. Yeah, but which state gets the Alamo? n/t

[Cleita]

25. There have been movements before to split California into three

states. There's the north part above Marin county to the Oregon border, then from Marin county to Los Angeles County in the Middle and the south part from Los Angeles to the Mexican border.

My problem is which part do we leave Arnold in? Since Sacramento falls on the border between the north and middle part, which would be my state, we would have to draw the line beneath it. He would be a better fit up north with all the freepers, neo-Nazis and the NRA type marijuana growers, so I would have to insist that is what would be Arnold's California.

We could call the middle part Muirland because it's where John Muir explored and discovered Yosemite. I guess the south could be Lalaland. Yeah, that would be cool.

How would you split up Texas? I think the coast and the Hill Country are nice. I never made it to the east, but the rest of it is too flat and dusty for my liking.

[mrdmk]

57. Cleita is correct

The California Assembly proposed splitting the state in the late eighties. It was because the Assembly people up north did not want to deal with the problems down here in the south. It was too much for them to think about. Then we had a couple of major earthquakes (one in San Francisco and the other in North Ridge) and the resources of the state were able to cover these disasters. The idea of spitting up the state thus quieted, and life went on. Please do not talk about splitting up California or you will cause another earthquake!

P.S. Please do not send Arnold S. down here either, we have enough conservatives to deal with. Besides it was not fun watching the conservatives cry about their houses being burned down to the ground because another so-called compassionate conservative could not cough up the money to cut down dead bug infested trees due to a four year drought. So now we give away the forest to the lumber industry and cut back the fire department. Of course some people do not know the forest from the trees.

Back to the thread: Do away with the Electoral College. We do not need it any more and does not make sense. Somewhere I have a red, blue and a shade of purple map of how people voted in the year of 2000. I look for it and put it in this thread.

[spooky3]

17. And, how about the (heavily Democratic) Wash DC residents?

They have no voting rep. in either the House or Senate. The city's population is greater than Wyoming's.

[loudsue]

29. I've read all the responses on this thread...and it's really

becoming apparent:

The voting and representative process in this country is WAAAYYY broken, and/or antiquated!

Our elections are being stolen by corporations and their secret-tabulating computers, and our districts are being hijacked by right wing extremist judges and legislatures, and huge chunks of tax paying citizens don't even HAVE a vote, and others don't have a representative! This is a situation that SERIOUSLY needs repair.

This, my friends, is NOT what our Nation's founders had in mind when they were drawing up a constitution! Doesn't the "intent" of the law hold any sanctity when it comes to the electoral process??

Yes...it's a big piece to bite off. But if we are going to survive as a Democracy in this new millineum, we're going to have to do some pretty dramatic work on this country.

The people in power NOW, are going to take the country down as a world power. But we still have WE, THE PEOPLE...and we're going to need to correct some horrible mistakes. Even the founders knew that we would have to change with the times....it's demonstrated throughout the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.

Any suggestions???

:kick:

[pmbryant]

30. The GOP has a vested interest in the status quo

It's what keeps them in power.

For my part, I think perhaps the single most anti-democratic (small d) process that we are subject to is gerrymandering of congressional districts by partisan legislators.

The politicans, thanks to modern-day data gathering and computer maps, can precisely select who they want their constituents to be. This is exactly the opposite of how it should work, though. Voters should choose their reps, not vice versa.

How do we get rid of this? Some states (e.g., Iowa) have processes to select non-partisan (or partisan-balanced) boards that then produce the redistricting maps. This is a huge improvement over having legislators do this.

But how do we get the legislators to give up this huge power they have?

There is actually a case before the Supreme Court this year about partisan gerrymandering in Pennsylvania in 2001. I have some slight hope that they will address this issue before it gets any worse.

--Peter

[Yupster]

33. The intent of the founding fathers

was not that there even had to be an election for president.

The state legislatures were to choose electors and the electors would vote for the new president. The people didn't have any part in the process.

It was only little by little that the states moved to even having a popular vote for president. It is not at all required by the Constitution - even today.

South Carolina was the last state to finally agree to hold a popular vote for President at all. That was in 1868, and it was hardly a fair election as Ulysses Grant won.

[loudsue]

46. Exactly, Yupster....that's what I'm saying....

THAT system needs repair. It isn't working. We need to have a constitutional mandate to make the vote reflect the will of the citizens, themselves...not the gerrymandered representatives of the population.

The people in power have taken ALL the power from the citizenry, and the people in power are the corporations and THEIR elected (by unsavory means) representatives.

I really don't think this is how the authors of the constitution intended things to be. It sure isn't looking anything like "majority rules, minority rights." It's looking more like "wealth rules (and appoints representatives), majority serves".


(edited 'cause I goofed:silly:)

[NavajoRug]

36. I think you raise an excellent point, but let's be clear . . .

Article I, Section 2 of the U.S. Constitution sets a LIMIT of one representative for every 30,000 people, but it doesn't specify how many representatives there MUST be at any given time. The limit of 435 Representatives is based on the 1929 Permanent Apportionment Act.

I agree that this limit is ridiculous in light of how large this country has grown, but it's hard to call this limit "arbitrary" and "unconstitutional" when it is written into a Federal law that is no more arbitrary and unconstitutional than the Constitution itself is on this issue.

Wyoming does have more representatives for its population than California does, but that's simply a function of another clause in Article I, Section 2 that requires each state to have at least one representative.

[Hippo_Tron]

37. There's a simple reason why Tom DeLay won't allow more house members...

He's too lazy to stand when he's running late and doesn't get a chair.

[Silverhair]

39. Gore's legal team was composed of very, very high powered lawyers.

And isn't Gore himself a lawyer? (It's late at night for me and I don't feel like looking it up.) Anyway, I am sure that they explored every possible arguement.

[librechik]

43. then why not demand a state-wide recount? That's the law in FL.

Half the confusion was caused because Gore only asked for 4 counties, Dem counties at that. Not only was it legally misinformed, it made it possible for the Pukes to spin him as craven. And Lieberman went right along with it.

[NavajoRug]

45. Your post is right on target . . . Bingo.

There are all sorts of complaints even to this day about how "Bush stole the election" in Florida in 2000, but the reality is that Gore was done in by the incompetence of his own legal team. In fact, I said at the time that the first thing Gore should have done after he conceded was to file a lawsuit against his legal team for providing incompetent counsel.

[ma4t]

55. Gore is not a lawyer

He attended law school for 1 or 2 semesters, I think at Vanderbilt, but withdrew, reportedly due to low academic performance.

[apsuman]

41. your answer

all of this is IMHO.

Your arguement fails on several fronts.

First, I agree that the electoral college has (among others) the flaw of giving small states (like WY) a greater proportional voice. Because of this, the small states will NEVER ratify the constituional change to get rid of the electoral college. It is not a republican thing, it is a power thing.

Second, the constitution requires that all states have at least one representative. A state with a population of 2300 would have one representative.

Third, the OMOV concept is the basis of our democracy, but it is not the basis of our republic.

Fourth, the 14th amendment does four things: In paragraph 1 It provides equal protection to all persons, and it made slaves and those born in this country citizens. In paragraph 2 it amends the necessary parts of the constitution to eliminate the three-fifths clause, and finally, it allows congress to punish states by removing some number of their representation in congress for disenfranchisement.

Just to reenforce that last point, the 14th amendment specifically says: "Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed."

It is the first thing that paragraph says. It eliminates the 3/5 clause and says that the apportionment will be by their numbers (population). It then says that this can be limited if in certain elections the state prevents certain people from voting.

[librechik]

44. I like this idea. Everyone suggest it to their congress critters please!

n/t

[Perky]

47. Its my opinion but.....

I think this is a basis for a seperate federal legal challenge to the approptionment fight in Texas. It super-enfranchises Montana voters overwhelmingly non-black at the expense of black voters in Texas.

[loudsue]

48. Hmmm...good point.....

Taken in the larger context, it does seem that way. Of course, like anything else, it would require the NAACP to get on board, and they seem to be sitting on their hands, to a large degree, these days.

We have a major uphill battle to get our rights back, that have systematically been stolen away by a very well organized, VERY well-funded right wing extremist minority.

Hell...even getting our votes to COUNT is an uphill battle these days.

:kick:

[Perky]

54. case law

reads that in a given state that while all districts must be essentially equal in terms of population thare can be as much as 2.5% variance from the arimtheetic mean of a 5% variance.


In the case of Montana vs California there is a 30% variance.

I can't imagine that the courst would rule that within the state they have to be esentailly equal but avross the states its ok to have such a wide variance.

[Name removed]

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