Amending the Feingold Amendment
As promised, Sen. Russ Feingold introduced a Constitutional Amendment requiring special elections to fill Senate vacancies.
SECTION 1. No person shall be a Senator from a State unless such person has been elected by the people thereof. When vacancies happen in the representation of any State in the Senate, the executive authority of such State shall issue writs of election to fill such vacancies.
Of course serious consideration of Constitutional Amendments occurs rarely. So if this "train" is really moving, this would be an excellent time to add some "cars." Here are some ideas:
* Direct election of Presidents; abolish the Electoral College. This has been proposed at various times in our history, most recently by President Jimmy Carter. And it fits perfectly with Feingold's language. We just need a section like this:
No person shall be a
Senator from a StatePresident unless such person has been elected by the peoplethereof.
This section would also require language that guarantees American citizens the right to vote for President. Right now, that right is exclusively in the hands of state legislatures through the Electoral College. And this is not a technical distinction; during the 2000 recount in Florida, the Republican majority in the State Legislature actually voted to reject the results of a recount if Gore came out ahead, and to appoint 25 Electors for Bush no matter what.
* Paper ballots with definitive manual recounts for Federal Elections. After the 2000 punchcard debacle, many states made voting worse by switching to blackbox touchscreen voting. We all know how touchscreens can be rigged. By contrast, the infinite superiority of paper ballots was beautifully demonstrated in the 2008 Minnesota Senate recount between Norm Coleman and Al Franken. Thanks to paper ballots, election officials were able to carefully recount all questionable ballots and apply consistent counting rules as required by Bush v. Gore. This manual recount would not have been possible on touchscreens.
* Automatic voter registration for all citizens. County governments waste a fortune maintaining voter files, which are grossly inaccurate and subject to fraud. (Of course Republicans like to scream about voter registration fraud by groups like ACORN, even though no Mickey Mouse votes were cast. )We could save a ton of money and ensure voter integrity by automatically registering every citizen. In 2005, I proposed a simple plan to use the Social Security file (without exposing Social Security numbers).
* Free TV time for Federal Candidates. The reason Congress works for The Corporations instead of The People (see Bailouts) is because candidates need vast sums of money for TV, and the easiest way to raise that money is to sell their souls to The Corporations (via PACs and bundling). If FCC licensing rules required broadcasters to give a minimum amount of free TV time to Congressional candidates, they wouldn't have to sell their souls to The Corporations.
* Full public funding for Federal Candidates. If we can slash campaign costs through free TV, we can easily cover the remaining costs through public financing. Without TV costs, a first-class House race can be run for $1 million. Take 435 races with 2 candidates and the total cost is $870 million. If we gave Senate candidates the same amount (based on the number of CD's in their state), each Senate cycle would cost $870/3= $225 million, since only 1/3 of Senate seats are up for election every 2 years. That brings the total cost to roughly $1 trillion, which is a tiny price for a clean Congress.
These are some friendly amendments I would add to the Feingold Amendment. How about you?
Update 1: Feingold's co-sponsors are John McCain, his McCain-Feingold campaign finance buddy, and freshman Mark Begich of Alaska. Begich probably signed on because Alaska's senior Senator, Lisa Murkowski, was appointed by her father Frank when he moved from the Senate to the Governor's office. That act of raw nepotism was so unpopular that Alaskan Republicans replaced Frank Murkowski with the former mayor of Wasilla, Sarah Palin. Palin cited this primary victory as "Exhibit A" that she was a reformer who was willing to "take on her own party."
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lots more in my book
which they're going to get around to publishing in september
David Swanson is the author of the introduction to "The 35 Articles of Impeachment and the Case for Prosecuting Geo
feel free
to share your relevant amendments here - we won't tell the publisher ;)
The National Popular Vote bill
The National Popular Vote bill would guarantee the Presidency to the candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states (and DC).
Every vote would be politically relevant and equal in presidential elections.
The bill would take effect only when enacted, in identical form, by states possessing a majority of the electoral votes—that is, enough electoral votes to elect a President (270 of 538). When the bill comes into effect, all the electoral votes from those states would be awarded to the presidential candidate who receives the most popular votes in all 50 states (and DC).
The bill is currently endorsed by 1,246 state legislators — 460 sponsors (in 48 states) and an additional 786 legislators who have cast recorded votes in favor of the bill.
The National Popular Vote bill has been endorsed by the New York Times, Chicago Sun-Times, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Los Angeles Times, Boston Globe, Hartford Courant, Miami Herald, Sarasota Herald Tribune, Sacramento Bee, The Tennessean, Fayetteville Observer, Anderson Herald Bulletin, Wichita Falls Times, The Columbian, and other newspapers. The bill has been endorsed by Common Cause, Fair Vote, and numerous other organizations.
In Gallup polls since 1944, only about 20% of the public has supported the current system of awarding all of a state’s electoral votes to the presidential candidate who receives the most votes in each separate state (with about 70% opposed and about 10% undecided). The recent Washington Post, Kaiser Family Foundation, and Harvard University poll shows 72% support for direct nationwide election of the President. This national result is similar to recent polls in Arkansas (80%), California (70%), Colorado (68%), Connecticut (73%), Delaware (75%), Kentucky (80%), Maine (71%), Massachusetts (73%), Michigan (73%), Mississippi (77%), Missouri (70%), New Hampshire (69%), Nebraska (74%), Nevada (72%), New Mexico (76%), New York (79%), North Carolina (74%), Ohio (70%), Pennsylvania (78%), Rhode Island (74%), Vermont (75%), Virginia (74%), Washington (77%), and Wisconsin (71%).
The National Popular Vote bill has passed 22 state legislative chambers, including one house in Arkansas, Colorado, Maine, Michigan, North Carolina, and Washington, and both houses in California, Hawaii, Illinois, New Jersey, Maryland, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Vermont. The bill has been enacted by Hawaii, Illinois, New Jersey, and Maryland. These four states possess 50 electoral votes — 19% of the 270 necessary to bring the law into effect.
See http://www.NationalPopularVote.com
The normal way of changing
The normal way of changing the method of electing the President is not a federal constitutional amendment, but changes in state law. The U.S. Constitution gives "exclusive" and "plenary" control to the states over the appointment of presidential electors.
Historically, virtually all of the previous major changes in the method of electing the President have come about by state legislative action. For example, the people had no vote for President in most states in the nation's first election in 1789. However, nowadays, as a result of changes in the state laws governing the appointment of presidential electors, the people have the right to vote for presidential electors in 100% of the states.
In 1789, only 3 states used the winner-take-all rule (awarding all of a state's electoral vote to the candidate who gets the most votes in the state). However, as a result of changes in state laws, the winner-take-all rule is now currently used by 48 of the 50 states.
In other words, neither of the two most important features of the current system of electing the President (namely, that the voters may vote and the winner-take-all rule) are in the U.S. Constitution. Neither was the choice of the Founders when they went back to their states to organize the nation's first presidential election.
In 1789, it was necessary to own a substantial amount of property in order to vote; however, as a result of changes in state laws, there are now no property requirements for voting in any state .
The normal process of effecting change in the method of electing the President is specified the U.S. Constitution, namely action by the state legislatures. This is how the current system was created, and this is the built-in method that the Constitution provides for making changes. The abnormal process is to go outside the Constitution, and amend it.
What the current U.S. Constitution says is "Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors . . ." The U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly characterized the authority of the state legislatures over the manner of awarding their electoral votes as "plenary" and "exclusive."
it is true and important
that changes in state laws have contributed to the electoral system we have now.
but it is equally true and important that Constitutional Amendments have also contributed by allowing blacks, women, and voters 18-21 to vote.
and there is a connection between the two, especially how women won the right to vote state-by-state before winning nationally with passage of the 19th amendment in 1920.
so we support both routes towards direct election of Presidents - National Popular Vote and a Constitutional Amendment :)