How would the electoral college be if the 435 representative rule never happened

[Skill and Chance]

So let's bring this to the present. What if the 1929 act never happened to lock in 435 members in the House, but instead codified what had been common practice since the Civil War.

In the 2010 Census only MI lost population and loses 2 seats as NY is the last to be brought up to their status quo. AK moves up to 3 seats, leaving only VT and WY with 2, so DC continues to get 4 electors. There are now 1140 members in the House and the average district has 270 K inhabitants.

In 2012 Obama wins the EC by 780 to 464 (1 EV from NE).
In 2016 Trump wins the EC by 705 to 539 (Trump gets 3 EV from ME and loses 2 in NE).

Though the expanded EC matched the popular vote winner in 2000, it would not in 2016. The senate seats in the EC don't impact this result either. It looks like this the sort of case the EC is meant for - to work against a candidate that relies too much on a regional base, regardless of popularity.

It's very interesting to me that having Senator electors only mattered in 2 of the 5* EV/PV split elections since the Civil War: 1876 and 2000.  Then there's 1916, when the Senator electors were strangely the only thing that saved Wilson even though he had a 3% PV margin nationwide.  It's remarkable how robust Harrison and Trump's wins were even though they lost the PV.  This points to the EC and the Senate being 2 fundamentally different issues when it comes to how representative/small d democratic the government is.

*I count 1960 as a Nixon PV win and therefore an EV/PV split, but the nationwide PV was so close that it comes down to a technicality of how to allocate votes in Alabama, where the electors were individually chosen and some Dem electors opposed Kennedy.

[Skill and Chance]

It's fascinating how much more robust Trump's EC win was than Bush's, despite losing the PV by a lot more than Bush did.  All other PV losers came within one state of losing the EC, save for Kennedy 1960 depending on what you believe about how to count the Alabama results.  If you believe Kennedy lost the PV (I do), then he lost it by <0.1% vs. >2% for Trump.

[Skill and Chance]

Going further back in time, it's worth noting that increasing the size of the House would eventually turn 1916 into an EV/PV split and elect Hughes over Wilson.  However, the House would have to be implausibly large to change the outcome.  Hughes won the existing House EV by 218/217 but only won 18 out of 48 states.  So just by allocating the additional seats proportionally to the original 435, Hughes would win with 11,590 EV to 11,561 EV for Wilson if the House had been 53X larger with 23,055 members but Wilson would still win if it was only 52X larger.  In practice, it would flip a bit sooner due to every state automatically getting a House seat regardless of population.  Wilson won all but one of the single CD states. 

[Skill and Chance]

I agree with using the Cube Root Rule. It certainly is the best method, due to being very objective.

The Wyoming Rule could cause massive fluctuations in House size depending on what the smallest state is, and how its growing in relation with the largest state (obviously not a problem now but it could be in the future). The Cube Root Rule, though, is more stable, so I like it. 👍

For example, let's try out the 2000, 2016, and 2020 elections with the Cube Root Rule:

2000 U.S. Presidential election

NOTES:
Populations apportioned based on the 1990 U.S. Census;
CT and RI have 10 and 5 EVs respectively

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[D] Al Gore/Joe Lieberman - 367 Electoral Votes - 48.5% of the popular vote ✅

[R] George W. Bush/Dick Cheney - 364 Electoral Votes - 47.9% of the popular vote

Beautiful!!!

2016 U.S. Presidential election

NOTES:
Populations apportioned based on the 2010 U.S. Census;
CT and RI have 10 and 4 EVs respectively

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[R] Donald Trump/Mike Pence - 443 Electoral Votes - 45.9% of the popular vote  ✅

[D] Hillary Clinton/Tim Kaine - 335 Electoral Votes - 48.0% of the popular vote

Due to the winner-take-all system used in most states, Clinton still takes the L.

Also, yes, I'm ignoring Maine and Nebraska both here and in the 2020 election. Not gonna try to make guesses.

2020 U.S. Presidential election

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[D] Joe Biden/Kamala Harris - 442 Electoral Votes - 51.3% of the popular vote  ✅

[R] Donald Trump/Mike Pence - 336 Electoral Votes - 46.8% of the popular vote

Interesting, so cube root isn't enough of an increase in the House to break the EC tie for Biden if he had lost WI/AZ/GA.

[Skill and Chance]

I remain surprised by how the EC bias managed to increase in 2020.  2012->16 has an obvious explanation with the massive swing from Romney to 3rd parties in California and Texas, but in 2020 California swung back right a bit and Texas didn't narrow very much.   Was it just that 435 was a bad US House size for Biden and he could have won with just MI and PA and the Nebraska EV under other circumstances (which would basically be the same EC bias as 2016)?  Or is this something inevitable with winner-take-all like 2016 was, like wasted Biden votes in the NE?