Lawmakers in Rhode Island Push for Dumping Electoral College

Wednesday, June 26, 2013

Jonathan Jacobs, GoLocalProv News Contributor

 

View Larger +

A popular movement to replace the Electoral College with a popular vote finds new momentum in RI.

Rhode Island lawmakers want to add their voices to a national movement to dump the Electoral College, and the effort is gaining momentum in the waning days of the current General Assembly session.

In spite of focused opposition by Minority Leadership within the Rhode Island General Assembly, House and Senate bills proposing a National Popular Election for President/Vice President has passed both chambers and has been referred to Senate Judiciary Committee for hearing and consideration.

Competing Messages to Lawmakers

The arguments center on bills, H-5575 and S-346 respectively, which seek to join Rhode Island to a movement to elect the president and vice president by national popular vote. 

GET THE LATEST BREAKING NEWS HERE -- SIGN UP FOR GOLOCAL FREE DAILY EBLAST

The battle was engaged on June 8th, when House Minority Leader, Brian Newberry (R - Burrilville, North Smithfield) updated his 2009 message about the imporance of the Electoral College, in a letter sent to the General Assembly.

“The Electoral College was created by the Founding Fathers for a reason," Newberry wrote. "We do not have a democracy; we have a republic - and the Electoral College serves a significant role within that structure.”

But Representative Raymond Gallison (D – Bristol/Portsmouth) returned fire on June 17th, and told GoLocal that he believes that the current National Popular Vote proposal "will guarantee that every vote, in every state, will matter in every presidential election.”

Gallison pointed to flaws he sees in the current system, where "presidential candidates have no reason to campaign in states where they are comfortably ahead or hopelessly behind. In the 2012 presidential election, four out of five Americans were ignored. Obama campaigned in just 8 closely divided battleground states and Romney did so in only 10. Rhode Island was NOT one of the states visited by the presidential candidates.”

Leader Newberry questioned the politics behind the movement. “This is part of a national movement that got its start after the 2000 election," he said, referring to the close elections between Al Gore and George W. Bush. "Without rehashing that debate, let us all agree that many people were surprised, angry etc. about the result. Consequently, while people of various political persuasions do support this idea, it was birthed and gains it strongest support from partisans angry about 2000 and desiring to avoid a repeat. To those who might support it for that reason, I say be careful what you wish for.”

Another "Florida Fiasco"?

Gallison said that Newberry's description of "the Florida fiasco" doesn't hold water. “Recounts would be far less likely under the National Popular Vote bill than under the current system because there would be a single large national pool of votes instead of 51 separate pools in the final tally," Gallison said. "No national recount is necessary and any potential recounts would only happen in states where the vote is close just like occurs today or if requested by a candidate like occurs today.”

Newberry also raised the concern that small states (like Rhode Island) are disadvantaged by a popular vote. “From a popular vote perspective we are a drop in the bucket,” he said. “The only reason we are often an afterthought in recent years is because we so reliably vote Democratic for president that there is no need to compete here.”

Gallison, again, disagreed. “Contrary to what Leader Newberry argues in his letter, the small states (the 13 states with only three or four electoral votes) are the most disadvantaged and ignored group of states under the current state-by-state winner-take-all method of awarding electoral votes," he said. "The reason is that political power in presidential elections comes from being a closely divided battleground state, and almost all of the small states are noncompetitive states in presidential elections.”

Democratic Operative Bell: An important step

Sam Bell, State Coordinator for the RI Progressive Democrats of America, considered the bill important, and predicted it would pass. “Under the current system, there are a number of states that voted for Obama but have complete Republican control at the state level: Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Florida. (Iowa Democrats control the state Senate.) Each of these states is heavily gerrymandered, making it difficult for Democrats to gain control of the legislature or win many of the US House seats. Maine and Nebraska allocate their votes by Congressional district, granting two votes to the statewide winner and the rest to the winner of each Congressional district. Legally speaking, there is nothing stopping Republicans from guaranteeing control of the presidency by implementing this system in each of the Obama-voting states they run. If they did that, they could have handed the election to Romney.

National status of the movement

Popular vote legislation has been enacted by 9 jurisdictions possessing 132 electoral votes--49% of the 270 necessary to activate the agreement. Those states include Hawaii, California, Washington State, Illinois, Maryland, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Vermont and the District of Columbia. The bill has been passed by a total of 31 legislative chambers in 21 jurisdictions. Under the National Popular Vote plan's pitch, "Rhode Island would participate in the presidential election. Candidates or their representatives would visit the state. Television and radio ads would be seen and heard in Rhode Island. There would be significant grassroots activity in the state because for the first time in recent memory, Rhode Island's votes WOULD count in the presidential election.”

“I believe that the National Popular Vote proposal will guarantee that every vote, in every state, will matter in every presidential election,” Gallison said. “We are known around the world for our democratic principle that whichever candidate receives the most votes is the winner. Yet, in the most important election in the world, we do not apply this principle to the election of our president. The principle applies to EVERY other election in this country, from city councilperson to governor to United States Senator. The voters of this country want the president of the United States elected by the national popular vote.”

Newberry cites Rhode Island's historic roots  in a final point. “When it comes to issues of constitutional balance, Rhode Island was not only the last signatory to the original Constitution - and only after insisting that the Bill of Rights be included – but, given our small size, strikes me as the last state in the union which ought to be ceding any of our constitutional prerogatives to some sort of larger national collective.”

 

Related Articles

 

Enjoy this post? Share it with others.

 
 

Sign Up for the Daily Eblast

I want to follow on Twitter

I want to Like on Facebook