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Not quite. The EC (along with the 3/5 compromise) was designed to protect the interests of slave-holding states, while also avoiding direct election of the pre

Not quite. The EC (along with the 3/5 compromise) was designed to protect the interests of slave-holding states, while also avoiding direct election of the president (ie, the people were too stupid to elect directly). And now, instead of tyranny of the majority, we have tyranny of the minority. Due to capping the number of members of the House, those small-population states have disparate impact on federal issues.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
gen220 6y ago
Post-Civil War, it also incentivized voter suppression. The southern states benefited from emancipation, insofar as they gained seats in the house and electoral college (they got a 5/3 multiple on their prior proportions, which had only narrowly elected Lincoln pewar). This redistribution of postwar power led to the disaster of 1877 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compromise_of_1877 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compromise_of_1877, something we're still grappling with to this day. One motivation for Jim Crow laws was to keep the southern voting-sampled portion of the south white and segregationist (in spite of the true distribution of local sentiment), while simultaneously benefiting from the larger population in magnifying their representation in national politics. ... If I were dictator for a day, I'd make the number of house and electoral college seats directly proportional to the last-n-election-cycle-average of number of participating voters (not population!). This change would flip the voter suppression script, which I think has been one of the more troubling developments in the last 100 years of our republic. It would also rightfully suppress the influence of the regions in this country that wish it was still the 1830s, but give them a path to return to influence that's contingent on uniting their polities. We'd see states competing to make voting more accessible in a nonpartisan manner, because every state wants to have more representation in the electoral college and the congress, regardless of which party is in power. This would force parties to actually represent their neighbors, whom they can safely ignore and suppress today. With this change as an example, I think the Electoral College could actually be leveraged to steer our system in more inclusive direction. I'd love to simulate this version of history.
- srtjstjsj 6y ago
  I wonder why no one's pushed for making representation based on votes not citizens or residents. That would incentivize states helping everyone vote. (But might also incentivize fraudulent counts)
  - gen220 6y ago
    I've thought of this before, but have no idea. It could be a lack of imagination? Sadly, it's more likely that both political parties are simply comfortable with the status quo. The republican party thinks they can gerrymander and voter-suppress their way to power. The democratic party thinks they can let the republican party self-destruct, since most of their tactics to hold on to power are illegal, especially as the demographics of our country's states become overwhelmingly out of their favor. But regardless of which party you belong to, I think universal suffrage is one of those rare principles that every American grows up believing in. As such, especially in 2020, it makes perfect sense to base federal representation on such a shared principle. It would definitely have the effect of moderating our society. It is a natural evolution of a concept we already have (proportional representation). It does away with the grimy roots of that concept (ceding representation to slaveholders). So, maybe one day.
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  > One motivation for Jim Crow laws was to keep the southern voting-sampled portion of the south white and segregationist (in spite of the true distribution of local sentiment), while simultaneously benefiting from the larger population in magnifying their representation in national politics. In theory, there is a (somewhat dated, given other evolutions in voting rights) remedy for that in Section 2 of the Fourteenth Amendment, though it can be hacked aroundt by selective criminalization (though that, in theory, is limited by Section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment). Unfortunately, neither of these has been very well enforced, especially Section 2.
  - gen220 6y ago
    I totally agree. It comes down to the legal definition of "abridged", "denied", and "crimes". Unfortunately, in the present political climate, any reasonable interpretation of these words that hurts the representation of states with regressive voting laws would be seen as an act of politics. The nice thing about my proposed hack, is that it also incentivizes decriminalization, or at least allowing a broader class of humans in your state to vote. In this way, it doesn't matter if the 14th amendment is well-enforced, because it changes the goal posts. So, while it might not give felons the vote (this would violate the 14th), it will encourage the dissolution of our current "justice" system that arbitrarily incarcerates people. If your state incarcerates people for "driving while black", it is effectively diluting its representation in the congress and electoral college.
rayiner 6y ago
This is false for several different reasons. There were two initial proposals for Congress: the New Jersey Plan and the Virginia Plan. (Virginia, of course, being the leading slave-owning state.) Under both plans, the President would have been elected by Congress. There were concerns that having Congress elect the President would jeopardize separation of powers. So the Electoral College was created, with one elector for each member of Congress. It had nothing to do with protecting the interests of slave-holding states, but instead was designed to make the Presidency more independent of Congress. Indirect election of the executive is somewhat anti-majoritarian, but also extremely common. Justin Trudeau was not elected Prime Minister of Canada by the general population. He was elected by about 80,000 eligible members of the Liberal Party, and became Prime Minister when the people elected other members of his party to the Parliament. I will add that the leading proponent of direct election of the President and the Senate was Andrew Jackson, strongly opposed abolition and was generally a horrible person. Now, the New Jersey Plan would have allocated one member of Congress to each state. It was also supported by New York, Delaware, and Connecticut. Of those, only Delaware had a significant enslaved population. The Virginia Plan created a two-chamber legislature with proportional representation based on population. Yes, slave-holding Virginia was the one that wanted proportional representation. The Connecticut Compromise that led to the current allocation really was about small versus large states, not slavery: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1790_United_States_Census https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1790_United_States_Census. Large states like Massachusetts and Pennsylvania had few to no enslaved persons, and small states like Georgia and Delaware had significant numbers of enslaved persons. The 3/5 compromise was designed to reduce the interest of slave-holding states. The number originated in an amendment proposed to the Articles of Confederation, which proposed to set the tax obligation for each state to the federal government "in proportion to the number of inhabitants of every age, sex, and quality, except Indians not paying taxes." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-fifths_Compromise#Confederation_Congress https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-fifths_Compromise#Confed.... Virginia complained that this would count enslaved persons, thus increasing Virginia's tax obligations. Eventually, they settled on counting 3/5 the number of enslaved persons towards the state's tax obligation. That same compromise came up later in the apportionment context.
- remarkEon 6y ago
salawat 6y ago
Try again. Read Federalist Paper 68. https://guides.loc.gov/federalist-papers/text-61-70 https://guides.loc.gov/federalist-papers/text-61-70 As well as the anti-Federalist Paper 72. Also keep in mind the Framer's never intended or expected the formation of organized national conventions. The Electoral College had zilch to do with slavery besides momentarily (in that time frame) possibly benefiting from how Southern States populations were calculated, but look how that turned out. Also, if you specifically look at what was outlined in the Federalist Papers, a Faithless Elector was a feature, not a bug. Political parties have completely ruined it by orchestrating to try to legally compel voting via data rather than by conscience and good sense, which fundamentally undermines the proof against a crowd pleaser, but ultimately incompetent actor the Framer's were trying guard against. I can understand being upset that the Electoral College doesn't seem to be working as promised, but it's the byproduct if taking the screwdriver that is the EC as designed and trying to use it to turn a nut. There is a level of not being applied as designed. You aren't going to fix that without revisiting some structural assumptions. Also, no, I squarely do not buy the Anti-Federalist tune that crowds are somehow free from being shaped and manipulated more than a small number of individuals relatively randomly selected put into a position of deliberation. People are collectively pulled down in the fidelity of collective reasoning by the damping effects socialization and large numbers, prone to passionate but ineffectual reasoning, and represent a great indicator that something need be done, though amazing at constraining a problem space through Wisdom of the masses, but terrible at managing the gory details for all of the shouting going on. A person is smart, capable of forethought, reasoned, and generally best equipped when given several options of being able to justify which is better, and developing a workable solution that balances against a wide variety if pre-existing weighting factors. The entire intent of the structure of our political process was to filter the energy of the whole, into paths of effectively achievable actions to be carried by a few such that the Nation could be driven without an undue on everyone. If you hate Jury duty, imagine how bad life would be if you had to be polled constantly on every decision needing to be made whether you knew anything about it or not.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

gen220 6y ago

Post-Civil War, it also incentivized voter suppression. The southern states benefited from emancipation, insofar as they gained seats in the house and electoral college (they got a 5/3 multiple on their prior proportions, which had only narrowly elected Lincoln pewar). This redistribution of postwar power led to the disaster of 1877 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compromise_of_1877 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compromise_of_1877, something we're still grappling with to this day. One motivation for Jim Crow laws was to keep the southern voting-sampled portion of the south white and segregationist (in spite of the true distribution of local sentiment), while simultaneously benefiting from the larger population in magnifying their representation in national politics. ... If I were dictator for a day, I'd make the number of house and electoral college seats directly proportional to the last-n-election-cycle-average of number of participating voters (not population!). This change would flip the voter suppression script, which I think has been one of the more troubling developments in the last 100 years of our republic. It would also rightfully suppress the influence of the regions in this country that wish it was still the 1830s, but give them a path to return to influence that's contingent on uniting their polities. We'd see states competing to make voting more accessible in a nonpartisan manner, because every state wants to have more representation in the electoral college and the congress, regardless of which party is in power. This would force parties to actually represent their neighbors, whom they can safely ignore and suppress today. With this change as an example, I think the Electoral College could actually be leveraged to steer our system in more inclusive direction. I'd love to simulate this version of history.

srtjstjsj 6y ago
I wonder why no one's pushed for making representation based on votes not citizens or residents. That would incentivize states helping everyone vote. (But might also incentivize fraudulent counts)
- gen220 6y ago
  I've thought of this before, but have no idea. It could be a lack of imagination? Sadly, it's more likely that both political parties are simply comfortable with the status quo. The republican party thinks they can gerrymander and voter-suppress their way to power. The democratic party thinks they can let the republican party self-destruct, since most of their tactics to hold on to power are illegal, especially as the demographics of our country's states become overwhelmingly out of their favor. But regardless of which party you belong to, I think universal suffrage is one of those rare principles that every American grows up believing in. As such, especially in 2020, it makes perfect sense to base federal representation on such a shared principle. It would definitely have the effect of moderating our society. It is a natural evolution of a concept we already have (proportional representation). It does away with the grimy roots of that concept (ceding representation to slaveholders). So, maybe one day.
dragonwriter 6y ago
> One motivation for Jim Crow laws was to keep the southern voting-sampled portion of the south white and segregationist (in spite of the true distribution of local sentiment), while simultaneously benefiting from the larger population in magnifying their representation in national politics. In theory, there is a (somewhat dated, given other evolutions in voting rights) remedy for that in Section 2 of the Fourteenth Amendment, though it can be hacked aroundt by selective criminalization (though that, in theory, is limited by Section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment). Unfortunately, neither of these has been very well enforced, especially Section 2.
- gen220 6y ago
  I totally agree. It comes down to the legal definition of "abridged", "denied", and "crimes". Unfortunately, in the present political climate, any reasonable interpretation of these words that hurts the representation of states with regressive voting laws would be seen as an act of politics. The nice thing about my proposed hack, is that it also incentivizes decriminalization, or at least allowing a broader class of humans in your state to vote. In this way, it doesn't matter if the 14th amendment is well-enforced, because it changes the goal posts. So, while it might not give felons the vote (this would violate the 14th), it will encourage the dissolution of our current "justice" system that arbitrarily incarcerates people. If your state incarcerates people for "driving while black", it is effectively diluting its representation in the congress and electoral college.

rayiner 6y ago

This is false for several different reasons. There were two initial proposals for Congress: the New Jersey Plan and the Virginia Plan. (Virginia, of course, being the leading slave-owning state.) Under both plans, the President would have been elected by Congress. There were concerns that having Congress elect the President would jeopardize separation of powers. So the Electoral College was created, with one elector for each member of Congress. It had nothing to do with protecting the interests of slave-holding states, but instead was designed to make the Presidency more independent of Congress. Indirect election of the executive is somewhat anti-majoritarian, but also extremely common. Justin Trudeau was not elected Prime Minister of Canada by the general population. He was elected by about 80,000 eligible members of the Liberal Party, and became Prime Minister when the people elected other members of his party to the Parliament. I will add that the leading proponent of direct election of the President and the Senate was Andrew Jackson, strongly opposed abolition and was generally a horrible person. Now, the New Jersey Plan would have allocated one member of Congress to each state. It was also supported by New York, Delaware, and Connecticut. Of those, only Delaware had a significant enslaved population. The Virginia Plan created a two-chamber legislature with proportional representation based on population. Yes, slave-holding Virginia was the one that wanted proportional representation. The Connecticut Compromise that led to the current allocation really was about small versus large states, not slavery: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1790_United_States_Census https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1790_United_States_Census. Large states like Massachusetts and Pennsylvania had few to no enslaved persons, and small states like Georgia and Delaware had significant numbers of enslaved persons. The 3/5 compromise was designed to reduce the interest of slave-holding states. The number originated in an amendment proposed to the Articles of Confederation, which proposed to set the tax obligation for each state to the federal government "in proportion to the number of inhabitants of every age, sex, and quality, except Indians not paying taxes." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-fifths_Compromise#Confederation_Congress https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-fifths_Compromise#Confed.... Virginia complained that this would count enslaved persons, thus increasing Virginia's tax obligations. Eventually, they settled on counting 3/5 the number of enslaved persons towards the state's tax obligation. That same compromise came up later in the apportionment context.

remarkEon 6y ago

salawat 6y ago

Try again. Read Federalist Paper 68. https://guides.loc.gov/federalist-papers/text-61-70 https://guides.loc.gov/federalist-papers/text-61-70 As well as the anti-Federalist Paper 72. Also keep in mind the Framer's never intended or expected the formation of organized national conventions. The Electoral College had zilch to do with slavery besides momentarily (in that time frame) possibly benefiting from how Southern States populations were calculated, but look how that turned out. Also, if you specifically look at what was outlined in the Federalist Papers, a Faithless Elector was a feature, not a bug. Political parties have completely ruined it by orchestrating to try to legally compel voting via data rather than by conscience and good sense, which fundamentally undermines the proof against a crowd pleaser, but ultimately incompetent actor the Framer's were trying guard against. I can understand being upset that the Electoral College doesn't seem to be working as promised, but it's the byproduct if taking the screwdriver that is the EC as designed and trying to use it to turn a nut. There is a level of not being applied as designed. You aren't going to fix that without revisiting some structural assumptions. Also, no, I squarely do not buy the Anti-Federalist tune that crowds are somehow free from being shaped and manipulated more than a small number of individuals relatively randomly selected put into a position of deliberation. People are collectively pulled down in the fidelity of collective reasoning by the damping effects socialization and large numbers, prone to passionate but ineffectual reasoning, and represent a great indicator that something need be done, though amazing at constraining a problem space through Wisdom of the masses, but terrible at managing the gory details for all of the shouting going on. A person is smart, capable of forethought, reasoned, and generally best equipped when given several options of being able to justify which is better, and developing a workable solution that balances against a wide variety if pre-existing weighting factors. The entire intent of the structure of our political process was to filter the energy of the whole, into paths of effectively achievable actions to be carried by a few such that the Nation could be driven without an undue on everyone. If you hate Jury duty, imagine how bad life would be if you had to be polled constantly on every decision needing to be made whether you knew anything about it or not.