Major campaign underway to nullify Electoral College

[emailking]

Even if enough states pass it, don't forget that tthis is done by state statute. Any legislature that doesn't like the way 2012 might turn out can just as easily repeal their state law before the electors would be certified. Only a constitutional amendment can change the system and not leave it open to partisan whim.

Not legally they can't. If a state wants to pull out of the compact they have to do so 6 months before the election. Otherwise, they are locked in for that election and would be breaking the compact if they did not allocate use the electors of the popular vote winner.

[emailking]

muon2 and VP Meeker, according to national Popular Vote it is unconstitutional for a state to pull out of the compact during the aforementioned 6 month period (which is actually prior to innauguration, not the election like I had said). For sure this would be a court challenge. But presumably many Constitutional lawyers have assured them this is very much binding.

http://www.nationalpopularvote.com/pages/faqitem.php?f=19

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[emailking]

Bill is now passed in Washington. 61 ev under the compact. 23% of the way there.

[emailking]

Hm. To me, it seems that there's a problem with a bare majority of the states deciding to completely change the way we elect a President, especially if the other states have opposed this compact. I really don't want half the states telling the other half of the states that they don't have a say anymore, especially if they have rejected this compact.

They don't have a say right now. The system is that every state legislature can decide in whatever manner they desire how to choose their Presidential electors. No state can change this.

Having a popular vote plurality election to allocate all of a state's electoral votes is a perfectly legal way of doing things should a state choose to do so. It's also 100% against the way the founding fathers intended this rule. Remember that. We're already exploiting a loophole to make things democratic. This just takes it one step further.

[emailking]

Using IRV determine the electoral votes for each state is an improvement but unlikely to occur anytime soon. Most people don't think about vote splitting or consider it a problem if they do. 

I see IRV is a separate issue. Yes, the best thing would be a national ballot determined by IRV (or condorcet really, as I would prefer). But right now there's a lot of support for a nationalizing the vote. Not so much for changing the ranking method.