An electoral college for Governor elections?
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  An electoral college for Governor elections?
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Author Topic: An electoral college for Governor elections?  (Read 1947 times)
rob in cal
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« on: August 16, 2009, 04:10:33 PM »

One of the critiques of going to a direct popular vote for president is that if we had it the candidates would concentrate all of their attention in the vote rich urban areas of the country and neglect the other states (in fact under the current situation they concentrate mostly on swing states and ignore everywhere else, populated or not).  Anyway, don't the same criticisms of a direct popular vote for president apply for governor races as well?  Should California think  about instituting its own electoral college for its governor races?  That way, candidates wouldn't focus just on the most populated coastal areas and campaign all over the state.  On the other hand to all those who would argue that a direct popular vote for governor in large, urban states is ok, than isn't it also ok for a national popular vote as well.  After all, states like California, New York, Florida and Illinois are in some respects miniature versions of the US as a whole.
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Хahar 🤔
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« Reply #1 on: August 16, 2009, 04:41:20 PM »

Georgia used to have one.
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Vepres
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« Reply #2 on: August 16, 2009, 06:12:07 PM »

The point of the electoral college is to make appealing to swing voters matter instead of getting high turnout from the base.

Anyway, an EC-like system wouldn't work in most places. The US is federalist, so it works here, but it wouldn't at the state level.
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Bacon King
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« Reply #3 on: August 16, 2009, 06:38:41 PM »

A state electoral college would have the same problems as the national one, except far worse. Also, I'm pretty sure Georgia's system (which was in the Democratic primary actually, but that was the only contest back then) was declared unconstitutional anyway.
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True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)
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« Reply #4 on: August 16, 2009, 07:48:27 PM »

Ever since one-man one-vote got interpreted to bar geographic distribution of voting power, it hasn't been possible to use a Gubernatorial electoral college even if a State wanted one.

Incidentally if we were to go back to the old system of divying up the General Assembly and implemented an electoral college for Governor

2002:


Sanford: 110 EV 53% PV
Hodges: 60 EV 47% PV

2006:


Sanford: 110 EV 55% PV
Moore: 60 EV 45% PV
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Badger
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« Reply #5 on: August 16, 2009, 09:05:20 PM »

The Electoral College is an antiquated and anti-democratic mechanism in presidential races; why would states want to inflict it on their grubenatorial races? It would only serve to unfairly dilute urban voters for rural ones.

Hmmmm.....I think I just answered my own question.
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rob in cal
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« Reply #6 on: August 16, 2009, 09:47:24 PM »

Right, as an opponent of the electoral college myself, it could only help the anti-side if the someone started talking about it for the state level.  People's opposition to it on the state level could spill over onto the federal level.
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True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)
Ernest
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« Reply #7 on: August 16, 2009, 11:34:49 PM »

The Electoral College is an antiquated and anti-democratic mechanism in presidential races; why would states want to inflict it on their gubernatorial races? It would only serve to unfairly dilute urban voters for rural ones.

Hmmmm.....I think I just answered my own question.

Actually, in South Carolina, the urban counties are for the most part Republican.  Of the 13 most populous counties, 11 are solidly Republican right now, 1 Democratic (Richland) and 1 swing (Charleston).  Under a EV plan, That's 70 solid Republican EV's, 10 Democratic and 10 swing.

The other 33 counties (80 EV collectively, especially the one's in the rural ones in the black belt, are the Democratic strong areas.

Granted, that is largely die to the fact that save for Richland County (and to a lesser extent Charleston), our most populous counties are dominated by suburbs rather than an urban core.

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jfern
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« Reply #8 on: August 16, 2009, 11:42:01 PM »

Gray Davis beat the recall in counties forming a majority of California's population.

As for suburban counties, Marin county is hardcore Democratic.
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Associate Justice PiT
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« Reply #9 on: August 16, 2009, 11:58:30 PM »

Gray Davis beat the recall in counties forming a majority of California's population.

As for suburban counties, Marin county is hardcore Democratic.

     Most of the greater Bay Area is hardcore Democratic, across urban, suburban, & rural areas alike. CA-11 is pretty much the only part that would ever be remotely close short of Susan Collins vs. Gene Taylor.
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jfern
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« Reply #10 on: August 17, 2009, 12:09:20 AM »

Gray Davis beat the recall in counties forming a majority of California's population.

As for suburban counties, Marin county is hardcore Democratic.

     Most of the greater Bay Area is hardcore Democratic, across urban, suburban, & rural areas alike. CA-11 is pretty much the only part that would ever be remotely close short of Susan Collins vs. Gene Taylor.

If no 3rd party candidates were allowed, and it was Tom Campbell / Dierdre Scozzafava vs Zell Miller / Fred Phelps, I think the former could win in even Berkeley.
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Associate Justice PiT
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« Reply #11 on: August 17, 2009, 12:38:39 AM »

Gray Davis beat the recall in counties forming a majority of California's population.

As for suburban counties, Marin county is hardcore Democratic.

     Most of the greater Bay Area is hardcore Democratic, across urban, suburban, & rural areas alike. CA-11 is pretty much the only part that would ever be remotely close short of Susan Collins vs. Gene Taylor.

If no 3rd party candidates were allowed, and it was Tom Campbell / Dierdre Scozzafava vs Zell Miller / Fred Phelps, I think the former could win in even Berkeley.

     I agree with you there. People in the Bay Area are politically aware enough to vote for the candidate that is genuinely closer to their views, rather than just voting based on the letter next to their names. What happens is that the Republican & Democratic parties are so polarized that that doesn't really matter anymore.
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minionofmidas
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« Reply #12 on: August 17, 2009, 05:28:32 AM »

The point of the electoral college is not to have to bother about uniform voting laws. Because these would become necessary if you did what everybody else in the world does and do away with the sillee idea. And the states wouldn't like it (the handful of states that hold their state elections on different dates might not mind too much, though.)
And not to have to bother about amending the US constitution as that's so darn complicated, of course.

That is to say, the EC now. The EC when it was first introduced was a weird compromise between the supporters of popular election, congressional election, and election by state governments, really. And didn't take the possibility of the emergence of a two-party system into account.
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Small Business Owner of Any Repute
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« Reply #13 on: August 17, 2009, 08:37:37 AM »


And Vermont still does, in a way.
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