A novel, intelligent method for Electoral Votes.

[crimsonblue]

Currently, the winner of the statewide vote gets all of a state's EVs (excluding NE and ME). The determination of EV per state is according to the number of Congressional districts plus the 2 senate seats. Under the system I propose, here is how it would play out:

• The winner of the statewide Popular Vote would receive the state's two EVs tied to the Senate
  
• The winner of the Popular Vote in each Congressional District would receive that District's EV
  
• In the case of a tie in a Congressional District, the candidate receiving more votes statewide would receive that District's EV
  

This method would combine the Electoral College and the principal of Popular Vote into one system. Each Congressional District has approximately equivalent numbers of residents, and therefore each EV would truly represent the will of each District. Winning the statewide vote would still matter, as the two senate EVs would go to the winner.

How would this help elections?

1. It would reduce the influence of the traditional centers of political power, and grant equal voting status to citizens in Sheboygen and New York City.
   
2. Nominees could not focus their entire energy or strategy on the traditional areas, forcing more time to be spent in less urban areas.
   
3. Even when a statewide popular vote is decided by 2000 votes, the citizens voting for the losing candidate could still see their District EV go to their candidate
   

Changing the EV to a Congressional District determination would open up elections, and allow third party candidates to receive better support and more robust idealogies would result.

Ok, flame on.

[Bill McBlueState]

1. Whoever draws the lines for congressional districts

suddenly would get a lot more power.

[begin_within]

2. The Republicans have been pushing that idea for a few years now in California

Since California almost inevitably goes to the Democratic candidate, the Rs want it changed to proportional, so that they get a piece of the pie. I think they have given up for the time being but I'm sure they'll try again.

[crimsonblue]

4. I think it is a good idea if done nationally..

Yeah, states like California and New York would have some EVs go red, but my state of Kansas would turn at least one EV blue. The more localized you can make democracy, the better.

[panader0]

3. This would be a definate improvement on the current system

I would like to do away with it altogether.

[dansolo]

5. I don't like it being tied to congressional districts.

That will only encourage even more gerrymandering. I think the two senate seat EVs should go to the overall state winner, and then the remaining EVs should be split proportionally according to the statewide vote totals.

[BzaDem]

6. This has some problems. I would favor a national popular vote pact.

That just replaces "swing states" with "swing congressional districts." Many congressional districts in America always vote overwhelmingly for one or the other candidates for President (even if the Congressional race in that district is close). For example, 2 out of 3 special elections where a Democratic Congressman won, voted for Bush in 2004 by 10-20 points. Even in swing states like Ohio, many districts are solidly red and some are solidly blue.

Furthermore, it doesn't replace the major problem with any winner take all system. In a winner take all system, some information is always lost. When a state goes overwhelmingly for one person, all votes over 50% are "wasted" (i.e. it doesn't matter how they voted; the outcome is still the same). With votes being counted by congressional district, that problem is simply repeated on a congressional district level.

The impact of gerrymandering increase substantially, and could result in something that looks like a winner take all system in practice. At least in the winner take all system, votes are allocated according to the census and not according to partisan lawmakers.

This also dramatically helps the candidate that wins smaller states, because of the 2-vote popular vote advantage in the many small states.

Finally, the system would not be stable. Each state has authority under the Constitution to allocate electoral votes how it sees fit. This plan would require every state in the country to change their voting system to this system. What would happen if just one state (small or large) changed back to winner-take-all? Suddenly, that state would be much more important than many of the other states. You would find that all states have an incentive to have their electoral votes be as influential as possible. One state switching would immediately cause many other states to switch, which would in turn cause all of the remaining holdouts to switch.

I think that a national popular vote system would be a better system. In such a system, states that total up to 270 electoral votes (for example, the 11 most populated states) would agree that they would cast their electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote (contingent upon the other states in the agreement pulling their weight -- otherwise, all would automatically revert to winner-take-all).

This plan is not without problems as well. It is much more stable than the vote-by-congressional-district plan, but it still is subject to the whims of states in the agreement to uphold the agreement. In addition, there is no official national popular vote, so how it would be counted (and how recounts would be done) would have to be dealt with somehow. This is especially difficult given the fact that each state runs their own election with different rules and different people on the ballot (and in fact, each county in effect runs their own election, making our presidential election the sum of thousands of different voting regimes). But I still think it would be better than the vote-by-congressional district idea.