EAC - Voluntary Voting System Guidelines

Name : | Danny Kleinman
Organization : | N/A
Post Date : | 9/30/2005
General Comments
Comment : | IMAGINE THERE’S ... A DEMOCRATIC VOTING SYSTEM Forget for a moment that in the United States we cannot vote for President but only for “electors” in an Electoral College; suppose this defect were to be fixed by providing direct voting for President. Forget also that we cannot vote for President without also voting for Vice President in a “package deal” of “candidate” and “running mate”; suppose this were also to be fixed, but without returning to this country’s original system for electing a Vice President. That was simply to hold an election for President and Vice President together (“vote for two“), with the candidate who received the second-highest number of votes becoming Vice President. Doing so had some merit. There were no “tie-in sales” of “strong” Presidential candidates with “weak” Vice-Presidential candidates, and the Vice President thus chosen was presumably thought capable of being President by a large segment of the electorate. Indeed, since the main role of the Vice President is to be next in line in case the President dies in (resigns, or is removed by impeachment from) office, this is an important merit. However, the election of 1800 highlighted a terrible defect of that system: the tie between Aaron Burr and Thomas Jefferson (both “Democratic Republicans” as the party now known as the Democratic Party was called at that time), broken only by a vote in the House of Representatives. Forget your own political preferences and convictions, as I will put aside mine for purposes of this essay. Though the 2000 election for U.S. President prompted me to write this essay, and I refer to the candidates, I did not write it in order to convince anyone to vote for any particular candidate. Indeed, not all of you who will read it are Americans. The only things you have in common are that you play duplicate bridge, and have the intelligence necessary to understand what I am about to say. Forget the kinds of voting systems that are familiar to you, and imagine instead that we were to start from scratch to design an optimal voting system for electing the President and Vice President of the United States, or Governor and Lieutenant Governor of a particular state, or any single office-holder (with or without one or more “next-in-line” candidates). Here, I suggest, are some desirable criteria for such a voting system. (1) Maximal Choice. Voters should not be limited to a choice of two candidates (e.g. Democrat and Republican). The ballot should include candidates of minor parties and independent candidates with no party affiliation at all. Indeed, the ballot should not be limited to just one candidate of each party. For example, in the current presidential election, the ballot might include two Democrats---Al Gore and Bill Bradley---and three Republicans---George Bush, John McCain, and Pat Buchanan (a lifelong Republican whose switch to the Reform Party stemmed not from a change in his political program but from a quirk in our election laws)---as well as candidates from minor parties.