League of Women Voters of Mountain Lakes
National Popular Vote Compact
Discussed at October Membership Meeting
The October Membership meeting featured Susan Lederman, Ph.D., a Professor of Public Administration at Kean University, who spoke to us about "Voting for the President--Can We Get Rid of the Electoral College?" She is a former US and NJ League president and is currently serving on the current National Popular Vote Committee for LWVUS. After giving a brief history of this topic, Lederman led an interesting and enlightening discussion regarding the issues surrounding the Electoral College versus the Popular Vote.
A prior League study of the presidential electoral process culminated in its position supporting direct election of the President and Vice-President by popular vote as an essential element of representative government and that the Electoral College should be abolished. Lederman explained it would take a Constitutional Amendment to accomplish this. The National Popular Vote Compact proposal would be an intermediate step toward this goal by awarding all of a state's electoral votes to the presidential candidate who receives the most popular vote nationwide. "The bill would take effect only when enacted, in identical form, by states possessing a majority of the electoral votes-that is, enough electoral votes to elect a President (270 of 538)." (LWVUS Study on the NPC Compact Paper) Lederman went on to state that the Constitution allows compacts between states and a recent compact involves water from the Great Lakes. Indeed, the Suffragettes used the "state by state route, which eventually led to the 19th Amendment." However, changing to this method may open our election process to the uncertainty of litigation at the State, District and Supreme Court levels. Lederman suggests that, "Challenges in court could lead to a pattern of decision making by courts-as far away from the popular vote as we could be".
In 2008, NJ passed legislation in support of the current National Popular Vote Compact, which calls for all of our state's electoral votes for President to go to the person who has the most votes nationwide. In addition to New Jersey, the compact currently has the support of Hawaii, Maryland and Illinois with a total of 50 electoral votes. If adopted, every single vote would count and, nationwide, every state would become a battleground state. Opponents wonder if the compact amongst the states will be effective enough without congressional approval. Proponents argue that once a state enters into the compact it is binding. They add that the founding fathers of our constitution created the Electoral College in fear of the elected person becoming a "king". The compact is aimed at preventing the election of a President who does not win the majority of the national popular vote, as has happened four times in this country's history, most recently in 2000 and the League has had its position on abolishing the electoral college for the past 38 years.
The NPV Compact is scheduled to be the subject of a national League study this year. Study materials are available online in the Members Only section at http://lwv.org. This spring, we will be asked if we concur with the compact or not. Where do you stand?