Electoral College Debate

Massachusetts is currently debating the National Popular Vote Bill. Last week, the House of Representatives passed the bill by a wide margin: 116-39. The Senate is scheduled to vote on the bill tomorrow or early next week.

Defending the electoral college system, Boston Globe columnist Jeff Jacoby prefers the status quo and believes the NPV is a bad idea.

Supporters of NPV believe that presidential candidates would be forced to pay attention to all states rather than swing states. But there's another way to get their attention.

In 2003, James D. Miller, an economist at Smith College, suggested that Massachusetts modify its electoral college system from the current winner-take-all format to proportional representation. Miller argues that this change would force even Democratic standard-bearers to actively campaign in 'safe' states like Massachusetts.

Here is my take on the electoral college.

Civics Lesson for Sal

The Boston Herald published my letter concerning Speaker Salvatore DiMasi's support for the "National Popular Vote" initiative.

Civics lesson for Sal

Speaker Sal DiMasi is wrong for endorsing the National Popular Vote initiative (“Salvatore DiMasi backs abolishing Electoral College process in favor of national vote,” July 1).

The Founders instituted the Electoral College for several reasons. Many argue that a switch to a popular vote system would enfranchise more voters; in fact it would disproportionately give more power to the larger states and metropolitan areas, leaving small states with little or no influence. Candidates would concentrate on densely populated areas where their resources could be more efficiently spent to reach voters. Voters in lesser populated areas would be ignored.

Furthermore, the National Popular Vote movement assumes the traditional, two-party system will hold. This will not be the case. We would see many elections like 1860, where the winning candidate only received 40 percent of the vote. A national popular vote system would encourage regional and issue-specific candidates, making it rare that one candidate would win a majority. A major candidate could only concentrate on his regions of strength and ignore the other parts of the country.

The Founders developed a system that has worked well for 218 years. Why change it now?

John Macek III