[Vision2020] Guess what’s happening in the U.S. Senate today . . .

[Ted Moffett]

Abolishing the electoral college is a very improbable task, requiring a
constitutional amendment!  Adopting a proportional allocation of electors
from each state given the percentage of votes for each candidate in each
state is consistent with the US Constitution.  There is no mandate in the
US Constitution for states to have a "winner take all system,"  which
disenfranchises voters in the presidential election.  Nebraska and Maine
now do not follow a "winner take all" allocation of electors.
Thus the electoral college system could remain in place with some states
with smaller populations still having an advantage in presidential
elections, under a proportional elector allocation system for all states.

All arguments one way or another aside regarding the current mostly "winner
take all" electoral college, it is rather incredible that the
unconstitutionality of this system is not first and foremost the final
argument!  Unless we want to toss the US Constitution out the window!

Vision2020 Post: Ted Moffett
------------------------------------------------
>From the American Bar Association:

http://www.abajournal.com/news/article/winner-take-all_electoral_college_system_is_unconstitutional_say_suits_by_b

Winner-take-all electoral college system is unconstitutional, say suits led
by Boies

BY DEBRA CASSENS WEISS <http://www.abajournal.com/authors/4/>

POSTED FEBRUARY 22, 2018

A coalition of prominent law firms and professors has filed four federal
lawsuits claiming the winner-take-all system of electoral college voting
distorts presidential campaigns and violates the U.S. Constitution.

The Constitution provides that “electors” choose the president and vice
president, while states determine how electors are selected, the suits
explain. Forty-eight states and Washington, D.C., have winner-take-all
systems for choosing electors in which the political party of the leading
candidate selects every elector. The system magnifies votes by those who
chose the winner and discards the votes of others.

In Texas, for example, Donald Trump received 52.2 percent of the vote in
2016, yet he received every single electoral vote in the state, according
to the suit filed there
<https://equalvotes.us/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Electoral-College-LULAC-et.-al.-Vs.-Texas..-et.-al-Complaint-Filed-Co....pdf>.
Hillary Clinton received 43.2 percent of the Texas vote, but zero electoral
votes. The suits are available here <https://equalvotes.us/legal-documents/>
.

The system allows candidates to win the election while losing the popular
vote.

The suits claim the system denies citizens the right to an equal vote in
presidential elections in violation of the right to political expression
and association under the First Amendment and the principle of one person,
one vote under the 14th Amendment. The suits also say the system places
minority voters at a disadvantage in violation of the Voting Rights Act.

The coalition is led by David Boies of Boies Schiller Flexner and the
League of United Latin American Citizens, as a result of a crowdfunding
campaign launched by <https://equalvotes.us/our-team/> Harvard law
professor Lawrence Lessig. A press release
<http://electionlawblog.org/wp-content/uploads/2018-02-21-WTA_PressRelease_FINAL-12-PM.pdf>
announced
the suits on Wednesday.

“Winner-take-all is not part of the Constitution,” Lessig writes in a post at
Medium.com
<https://medium.com/@lessig/equalvotes-us-where-we-are-where-were-going-b421ae6c2e09>
.

“Winner-take-all meant that presidential campaigns were focused on a dozen
states only; winner-take-all meant that the chance of a minority-elected
president was high; and winner-take-all made America vulnerable to the
games evil foreign governments might play, to hack our democracy and defeat
majority will,” Lessig writes.

The suits were filed in the solidly Republican states of South Carolina and
Texas and the solidly Democratic states of Massachusetts and California.
Law.com
<https://www.law.com/sites/therecorder/2018/02/21/boies-led-coalition-challenges-winner-take-all-method-of-electoral-college/>
, Reuters
<https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-vote-lawsuit/lawsuits-challenge-electoral-college-system-in-four-u-s-states-idUSKCN1G52HY>
 and Bloomberg News
<https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-02-21/winner-take-all-electoral-practice-faces-voter-rights-challenge>
have
coverage.

Plaintiffs in the suits include LULAC, actor and comedian Paul Rodriguez,
and former Massachusetts Gov. William Weld, who was the Libertarian Party’s
2016 vice presidential nominee. Support for the suits was launched by
Lessig’s group, EqualCitizens.US.

BigLaw firms working on the suits include Hausfeld, Alston & Bird, and
Steptoe & Johnson. Also working with Boies and Lessig are former White
House chief ethics lawyer Richard Painter, New York University law
professor Samuel Issacharoff, and Duke law professor Guy-Uriel Charles.


On Tue, Apr 2, 2019 at 3:59 PM Tom Hansen <thansen at moscow.com> wrote:

> You’ve got your beliefs.  I’ve got mine.  So be it.
>
> Seeya 'round town, Moscow, because . . .
>
> "Moscow Cares" (the most fun you can have with your pants on)
> http://www.MoscowCares.com <http://www.moscowcares.com/>
>
> Tom Hansen
> Moscow, Idaho
>
> On Apr 2, 2019, at 3:15 PM, Darrell Keim <keim153 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> I got your drift from the start and Disagree.  Majority rules all to
> easily becomes mob rule.
>
> On Tue, Apr 2, 2019, 3:11 PM Tom Hansen <thansen at moscow.com> wrote:
>
>> Darrel . . . Darrel . . . Darrel . . .
>>
>> Even in those large cities (like Los Angeles, where I was born and
>> raised) each person’s vote is counted no more than once . . . just like
>> Bovill, Idaho.
>>
>> It’s a simple matter of *“Rule By Majority”* (a really neat-o concept,
>> huh?) . . . whether you voted in downtown New York City or a community
>> center in Viola, Idaho.  Restrict presidential elections to the popular
>> vote.
>>
>> Are you catchin’ my drift?
>>
>> Seeya 'round town, Moscow, because . . .
>>
>> "Moscow Cares" (the most fun you can have with your pants on)
>> http://www.MoscowCares.com <http://www.moscowcares.com/>
>>
>> Tom Hansen
>> Moscow, Idaho
>>
>>
>> On Apr 2, 2019, at 2:50 PM, Darrell Keim <keim153 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> Yes, it has all those faults.  And, thanks to the electoral college, the
>> presidential election isn't decided by a few large cities on the coasts.
>> No such thing as a perfect solution here.
>>
>> On Tue, Apr 2, 2019 at 1:50 PM Tom Hansen <thansen at moscow.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Thanks to the electoral college, NOBODY is less significant than a
>>> democrat voter in Idaho during a presidential election.
>>>
>>> In Idaho, the candidate that wins the majority of the votes is given all
>>> four of Idaho’s electoral votes.
>>>
>>> Example . . .
>>>
>>> Say Idaho has 500,001 registered voters and they all vote.  Candidate A
>>> receives 250,001 votes and Candidate B receives 250,000.  Since Candidate A
>>> won the majority of votes cast, (s)he is given ALL of Idaho’s electoral
>>> votes.
>>>
>>> Question:  What ever happened to . . . *ONE PERSON = ONE VOTE*?
>>>
>>> FYI, a vast majority of the states (all but a few) award their electoral
>>> votes in this fashion.  Why do you think Trump (with some help from his
>>> buddy Vladmir) won the 2016 Presidential Election?
>>>
>>> Seeya 'round town, Moscow, because . . .
>>>
>>> "Moscow Cares" (the most fun you can have with your pants on)
>>> http://www.MoscowCares.com <http://www.moscowcares.com/>
>>>
>>> Tom Hansen
>>> Moscow, Idaho
>>>
>>> On Apr 2, 2019, at 1:15 PM, Darrell <keim152 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> I hope they fail...
>>>
>>> On Tue, Apr 2, 2019, 8:14 AM Tom Hansen <thansen at moscow.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Let’s take a look-see . . .
>>>>
>>>> http://www.tomandrodna.com/MoscowCares/Photos/US_Senate_040319.jpg
>>>>
>>>> Seeya 'round town, Moscow, because . . .
>>>>
>>>> "Moscow Cares" (the most fun you can have with your pants on)
>>>> http://www.MoscowCares.com <http://www.moscowcares.com/>
>>>>
>>>> Tom Hansen
>>>> Moscow, Idaho
>>>>
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>>>
>>> =======================================================
>> List services made available by First Step Internet,
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>> =======================================================
>>
>> =======================================================
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