Columns
Representative democracy: Two steps forward
By John Burbank
May 13, 2009—Our state legislators spent most of their time bemoaning the economy and the deficit, and undermining public services this year. But even amid the wreckage, they managed ...
National Popular Vote: What a concept, the presidential candidate with the most votes wins
by Rick Attig
May 2, 2009—Slowly, steadily, this country is moving toward a better, fairer way of electing a president.
Let’s shut this college down
By Tom Crawford
December 27, 2008—It was a moment for the history books last week as 15 Georgians gathered at the Golden Dome to play their role in finalizing the Electoral College outcome ...
The American Debate: Electoral College is not a system for a democracy
By Dick Polman
December 7, 2008—I spoke to a lot of audiences during the recent election season, and invariably someone would stand up and ask whether I thought we should ditch the Electoral College and choose ...
Skewed Electioneering Could Be Fixed
By Neal Peirce
November 2, 2008—It’s happening again. Some of us live in states jumping with candidate visits and presidential election season excitement. But in others visits and attention are ...
When winner takes all, we lose: Fix electoral college now
By Bill Hammond
October 28, 2008—No matter who wins the presidential election next week, it's already clear who lost: the 8.6 million voters of New York State.
John Baer: It's time to rethink primaries and let democracy rise
By John Baer
June 11, 2008—I HAVE TO CONFESS. The presidential primary season that just ended hit me — a practicing political cynic — as a remarkable bit of democracy. We had a winter and spring of record ...
Commentary: Popular Vote
By Lee Cullum
May 9, 2008—If there's one thing this country needs this year it is a clear winner in the presidential election. Nerves are too raw, given the bank-and-housing crisis, plus the wars in Iraq and ...
A better way to elect a president
By Scot Lehigh
May 6, 2008—IF THERE’S one constitutional idea whose time has come and gone, it’s the Electoral College. That arrangement for electing a president is a throwback to a different age, designed ...
A One-of-a-Kind Rube Goldberg Election Machine
By Peter Schrag
February 5, 2008—It's Super Tuesday, the pinnacle of what's now surely the most cockamamie election nonsystem ever devised by the mind of man (and woman, too, if you insist). Voters in California ...
Dropping Out of Electoral College
By Martha Biondi
December 31, 2007—A Stanford University computer scientist named John Koza has formulated a compelling and pragmatic alternative to the Electoral College. It’s called National ...
Electoral College is past its prime
By Joel Connelly
November 20, 2007—WHEN A PRESIDENT is elected after losing the popular vote, and installed by U.S. Supreme Court fiat, it's high time for this country to reform its archaic Electoral College ...
A simple reform: Count all votes
By Martin Dyckman
August 27, 2007—The Republicans thought it was a bad idea when Gov. Lawton Chiles proposed in 1991 to split Florida's presidential electors by congressional districts, as Maine and Nebraska ...
Comment: Pile Up
by Hendrik Hertzberg
April 16, 2007—Over the past few months, the constitution of the United States has been quietly amended. We’re not talking here about the written, capital-“C” Constitution, which can’t be ...
In voting to end electoral college, Maryland dares to go where Schwarzenegger wouldn't
George Skelton
April 12, 2007—The governor of Maryland did Tuesday what the governor of California should have done last fall: sign a bill making his state the first to begin junking the electoral ...
Bypassing the Electoral College
By E. J. Dionne Jr.
April 2, 2007—"The individual citizen has no federal constitutional right to vote for electors for the President of the United States. . . . " That is not some reactionary piece of ...
Dump the electoral college: There's no good reason to keep a silly system that makes the second-place finisher president
By Jonathan Chait
October 15, 2006—The electoral college is an integral part of our democratic system. So you'd think there would have to be some decent reasons why we keep it around. But, for the life of me, I ...
Capitol Journal: Governor Can Help to Make Every Vote Count
By George Skelton
September 21, 2006—In a previous incarnation, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger was a self-described reformer and champion of direct democracy. That worked fine for him one year, but was a disaster the ...
Electoral Vote Reform: Is It an Idea Whose Time Has Come?
By Louis Jacobson
May 10, 2006—It isn’t often that an electoral-mechanics issue gets wide public attention, but a recent proposal to shift the nation’s complicated but well-entrenched Electoral College system to a national ...
Electoral tinkering
By John Fortier
March 22, 2006—What if they amended the Constitution but didn’t ask Congress? That is just what some opponents of the Electoral College want to do. And there is nothing wrong ...
Electoral College Drop-Out: A new proposal aims to circumvent the Electoral College and return the franchise to most of America’s voters
By Andrew Gumbel
March 9, 2006—A new proposal aims to circumvent the Electoral College and return the franchise to most of America’s voters.
At long last: A truly fair popular presidential vote?
By Neal R. Peirce
March 5, 2006—Ever since the 1960s, when I wrote a book optimistically titled The People's President — I've been intrigued, and frustrated, by the Electoral College. How could we stick with a system that ...
Comment: Count ‘Em
By Hendrik Hertzberg
February 27, 2006—Last Thursday morning, in one of the smaller function rooms at the National Press Club, in Washington, an ad-hoc bunch of amateurs, once-weres, might-bes, and goo-goos floated ...
