Electing an American President

Now that the Federal and Municipal elections are history, a history that one may or may not be happy about, let us leave that issue until all the dust settles and look at the American election next week.

Although all eyes and thoughts shall be on the Presidential election, remember that this is a general election. The entire House of Representatives, one-third of the Senate, numerous state elections for Governor and the bicameral state legislatures, and numerous municipal councils will all take place. In certain states, for example California, there will be ‘Ballot Questions’ which may include budgetary matters, state Constitutional amendments, social issues, and environmental matters. Pity the poor American voter faced with such choices.

In certain states the voter is presented with a paper ballot, but in others they have voting machines. Do you remember 2000 and the ‘hanging chads’ of Florida, or Ohio in 2004 when the manufacturer of the voting machines used there gave a large donation to the Republicans, making many Democrats believe that the machines were ‘rigged’ in favour of Bush and whoever won Ohio won the Presidency.

Is it any wonder that America is the home of the conspiracy theorist when it comes to elections? After eight years

we do not know who won in 2000 and was Kerry robbed in 2004?

Each state has own electoral law

There is nothing in American law that corresponds to the Canada Elections Act. However, there are federal laws concerning the age when one can vote, voting rights that prevent racial discrimination that was rampant in the South before 1964, and election expenses. Each state has its own electoral law even for national elections. That is why on Tuesday night the television networks will start to give the results nationally when the polls are still open in almost all of the states save Kentucky.

In 1980, Jimmy Carter conceded defeat while the polls where still open in the West, which resulted in many Democrats in those states not bothering to vote and allowed Republicans to win some races they were not expected to.

Residency is another issue: if you move from state A to state B and even though you have lived in the U.S. all your life, you may not be able to vote because you don’t meet the residency requirements. In the U.S., as in Canada today, it is the citizen’s duty to register to vote and not the states to get you on the list, as is still the rule in some Canadian provinces that enumerate voters. There has been a move to have states put individuals on the voters’ list when they renew their driver’s licenses, which is not a bad idea and one we could adopt in Canada.

The Founding Fathers were of the view that the Presidency was far too important a post to be elected by the general male public.

Alexander Hamilton thought the President should serve for life. As a compromise, they developed the elitist concept of the Electoral College for selecting the President. In truth what Americans are doing next week is selecting the members of the Electoral College. Forty-eight of the states have adopted the ‘first past the post’ electoral system, thus it is a case of winner take all except for Maine and Nebraska, which apportion their electoral vote proportionately. One can see that in a state like Ohio or Florida it would be virtually impossible to have a judicial recount. There are 538 Electors and 207 are needed to win. California has the most votes, 55, as it has 53 Members of the House and 2 Senators. The composition of the College changes after each national census.

Electoral College meets to pick the President

The members of the Electoral College meet together in the 50 state capitals on the first Wednesday in December to elect the President. The Electors may be pledged to vote for the candidate who won their state in November, but it is not the law that they must so vote; in 2004, one Elector in Minnesota voted for John Edwards.

The Electoral vote is not counted in the Senate until early in January. If no candidate has 207 votes, the election of the President is given to the House of Representatives, where each state casts a single vote, which may be fine for Wyoming since it has a single member, but what about New York, with 29?

The Senate in the meantime elects the Vice-President. This is the potential Achilles heel of the American system. The President’s term ends at a specific time in mid-January; there is no extension. If members of the Electoral College do not vote as the results of next Tuesday suggest they do, the result could be chaos. It is because of the Electoral College that the U.S. has a two-party system composed of what are classified as ‘brokerage parties.’

Recent elections have given us a general idea of how each state will vote. California, for example, is considered safe for the Democrats so neither Obama nor McCain will spend much time there, but Ohio, like Florida, could go either way and are described as ‘in play’.

Thanks to Richard Nixon’s “Southern Strategy” (Nixon was a much better political strategist than he was President), the South has been almost solidly Republican for the past six elections. However, Senator Obama’s candidacy may well change this, making the outcome of this election more difficult to predict.

It used to be said that a popular candidate like Eisenhower or Lyndon Johnson had “coattails”; that is they could drag many of their Party’s candidates into office because of their popularity, their charisma and their strong campaign. Do any of this year’s candidates have ‘coattails’?

In spite of the cries of the conspiracy theorists, it is remarkable that this system works. From time to time there have been calls for the removal of the Electoral College and let the results of the November election stand, but Americans are a conservative lot with great respect for the Founding Fathers, and calls for reform fall to the ground like the autumn leaves.