Talk:National Popular Vote Interstate Compact

GA fail

I'm sorry, but I cannot pass the article as this time. Here are some things for you to work on before renominating the article:

• There are entire sections without references (Details of the proposed legislation, 2006).
• There are sections that need to be wikified as they have few or no wikilinks (Details of the proposed legislation, Background)
• The references need to be formatted properly using the Template:cite web.
• Headers should have more than one sentence under them. Is there nothing else that can be said under 2006 and 2007? Maybe the two sections could be merged together?

Good luck. Nikki311 03:01, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Other problems with the compact

This I found in comments in Ballot Access News: "You cannot have a national election without first establishing common voting requirements. Felon voting? Registration dates? Early ballot access?" [1] Perhaps we should include this in the article (if it can be properly sourced), since it is claimed to be the reason that the Washington House did not take up this bill. --KarlFrei (talk) 08:33, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

I doubt it's the reason the Washington house didn't follow suit -- more leadership decisions about priorities at the end of a short session. But it's a reasonable concern to include, although the formulation should not be "you cannot have a national election " but rather "you should not have a national election". The basis of the compact is that legislatures can decide to allocate electors on whatever basis they so choose,and there is an official national popular vote count generated from the numbers provided by each state and D.C. to Congress in the form of Certificates of Ascertainment. Note that the suggested changes could be done by federal statute if there was political will to do so.

RRichie (talk) 13:09, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Why is it important that states have more uniform standards? This issue of unform standards isn't unique to the NPV since our current system also lacks uniform standards. Also, I believe it is likely that quibbling about registration dates and felon voting arises from conviction that all votes should be treated equally; Certainly the NPV comes much closer to the equal treatment of "1 person, 1 vote", despite minor discrepancies about felon voting. Furthermore, by joining in NPVIC states facilitate the trend towards a uniform standard. The whole argument seems dubious. You can cite it if you can source it, but you might just be looking at nothing more than the naked assertion of some dude in a comments section. Greg Comlish (talk) 16:03, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

The obvious problem would be that there would be a "race to the bottom" as each state tries to increase its vote count. Suppose California, for example, lowered its voting age to 16 and allowed non-citizens to vote. This would increase its relative weight in the national popular vote and force other states to follow suit. Grover cleveland (talk) 17:05, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Well if you can cite good sources making that argument, feel free to add it... although it doesn't seem realistic to me. Voters in a state don't vote as a bloc, so letting foreigners or children vote wouldn't really give the state much more power; it would mainly give the state's foreigners and children more power. I can't imagine majority support for such a move in any state.

Szu (talk) 03:08, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

I thought these issues were brought up in a previous discussion here. If anyone thinks the arguments are important enough to be added to the "Debate" section, they should go ahead and do so as long as the sources are good.

Szu (talk) 00:08, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

Do you have a reference for the use of Certificates of Ascertainment to certify the totals? If there is, this should be in the article, since it would probably clarify things a bit. — Swpb^{t & c} 13:36, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

The compact doesn't specifically say that states must use Certificates of Ascertainment to calculate their national totals, but it does say that they "shall treat as conclusive an official statement containing the number of popular votes in a state for each presidential slate..." An official statement would be available for every state because Certificates of Ascertainment are required by federal law (see National Archives) and must include the number of votes received by each slate.

Szu (talk) 18:28, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

The article states that "states wishing to join or withdraw from the compact after that date would not be able to do so until after the election." If a member state were to pass a bill negating the NPVIC after July 20th, what enforcement mechanism would prevent them from apportioning their delegates however they choose? — Swpb^{t & c} 01:01, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

I assume they would be sued in some federal court? Surely there have been lawsuits between states before. The law negating NPVIC could not be legal for a state that has joined the compact. (Also, there must be other interstate compacts, right?) --KarlFrei (talk) 07:16, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Ok, I've been doing a bit more reading about this. States can take each other to federal court over violating the terms of interstate compacts. Now, the question of whether this compact would require congressional approval, that's much hairier. Supreme Court precedent on the Compact Clause indicates that a compact must only be approved by congress if it may increase the political power or influence of the member states. In White and Blackmun's dissent in U.S. Steel Corp. v. Multistate Tax Commission (1978), they claim that this test includes encroachment on the political power of non-member states, not just on the federal government (which, constitutionally, has no power in the area of elector selection). But it's unclear whether the Court would 1) recognize this part of the test, 2) see the NPVIC as encroaching on the political power of non-member states, or 3) reverse precedent anyway, making it all moot. — Swpb^{t & c} 14:11, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

I fail to see how this compact could ever be seen as reducing the political power of the other states. It would be a different matter if the compact specified that the members would give all of their electoral votes to the popular vote winner of the member states. But now, all votes still count. However, it is of course true that the smallest non-member states could see their "influence" drop by a factor of 2 (or something), because their number of electors is no longer relevant. From a strategic point of view, it is probably important to ensure that as many small states as possible join this compact before it becomes effective... --KarlFrei (talk) 08:54, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

When it comes to the Courts, I'm not sure the degree to which political influence is shifted is going to matter as much as whether it is or isn't (or whether it potentially could be). You're right that voters in some states will see their influence drop (even voters in small member states will see their votes count for less, and voters in large non-member states would see their votes count for more under the compact).

The other factors affecting whether a state is seen to benefit from the compact include whether or not it is a battleground state (subjective) and whether the bloc of states it caucuses with benefits as a whole from the compact (i.e., a populous, non-battleground state like Texas should theoretically benefit, but if it tends to vote with the Republicans (who, let's not mince words, stand to lose from the NPVIC), then it could be seen to lose out. This is clearly also very subjective). So the set of states which benefit from the compact could be debated ad infinitum, and is clearly not identical to the set of member states. I see the compact as causing a political power shift toward equitability, but this could be debated as well, and would not necessarily cause the compact to pass the test.

Also, the Court test may not look at the political power of the citizens of the states, but of the states themselves (i.e., the state governments). Under the compact, legislatures of non-member states can still appoint their electors however they choose, but this choice is guaranteed to have zero effect on the outcome of the election. This may be a much stronger argument for the Court to require Congressional approval of the compact. — Swpb^{t & c} 13:42, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

There are legal articles, cited in this article, that address these points substantially. An argument as you've articulate, Swpb, is essentially what is made: that non-compacting states have worthless electors, because the compacting states' electors are sufficient to elect a winner without any help from outside non-compacting states. --Merevaudevillian (talk) 14:12, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Yes, states may bring interstate disputes directly to the Supreme Court. --Merevaudevillian (talk) 14:12, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

This is perhaps off topic, but is it so clear that the Republicans stand to lose from this compact? They have won the popular vote in the most recent presidential election, and in many elections before that... Sure, things don't look so good for them right now, but who knows what will happen in four or eight years? --KarlFrei (talk) 21:06, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

It's likely off-topic, but I'll give it a shot. First, I think Republicans are relectuant to engage in "change" in this way, when the Electoral College was a cornerstone of the Constitution; and they are reluctant to engage in what is perceived as an "end-run" around the ordinary constitutional amendment process (e.g., requiring just a majority of electoral votes to approve, rather than supermajorities of Congress and 3/4 of the states). Second, and more practically, I think Republicans tend to prefer the Electoral College system in which the more rural Western states have a slight advantage in terms of electoral votes, even if they're not typically "swing states." Wyoming, for instance, may not be a stomping ground of political activity, but it's a relatively solid 3 electoral votes, which, as we know, is the margin of victory that Bush had over Gore, even though Wyoming was never in doubt. --Merevaudevillian (talk) 14:12, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Merevaudevillian makes the point well. The bloc that stands to lose is geographic in nature (rural, mostly western and some southern states), and at present, this bloc of states uses its Electoral College advantage to the benefit of the Republicans. The party benefiting from this situation could change, but the fundamental point (the one that could play with the Courts) is that a state which might be seen to benefit from the compact, based on having a high population, might in fact suffer politically, if it tends to vote together with a group of states that lose power on the whole. — Swpb^{t & c} 14:56, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Can you justify your claim that "rural, mostly western and some southern states" stand to lose by joining the compact? Greg Comlish (talk) 15:43, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

I agree that Republicans are more reluctant to change things. But I think the idea that they stand to lose in practical terms is a myth. The states most overrepresented in the EC are in fact an equal mix of red and blue: 1. WY, 2. DC, 3. VT, 4. ND, 5. AK, 6. RI, 7. SD, 8. DE, 9. MT, 10. HI. The states most underrepresented in the EC are also evenly split: 1. TX, 2. FL, 3. CA, 4. GA, 5. AZ, 6. NY, 7. IL, 8. NC, 9. VA, 10. MI. But IMO the states that would benefit the most from the compact are the 40 or so states that aren't swing states.

We really shouldn't be discussing this here though; this space should be for discussion about the article itself. Feel free to continue on my talk page if you like.

Szu (talk) 17:44, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

Again, the point is not whether this or that state benefits. In determining whether congressional approval is needed, the test may be whether any group of states might gain political advantage at the expense of others, no matter which group that may be. I may be wrong about which group I think that is, but Szu is right that that conversation strays too far off topic for this talk page. — Swpb^{t & c} 04:32, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Does a state have to report the vote? Or can they just report the winner? In the primaries the real popular vote was unknown because some states did not report the vote just the winner. So lets say that a state that was in strong opposition to this compact just gave the vote total of the winning candidate, and did not state the popular vote of the losing candidate. Is that possible and how would that affect the compact?

States are required by an Act of Congress to provide their vote totals in the form of a certificate of ascertainment. Many such details of the plan are addressed in Every Vote Equal (www.everyvoteequal.com), which is available on-line and has a detailed appendix and table of contents.

RRichie (talk) 15:43, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Some time back there was, on the Range Voting mailing list, [2], some discussion of what happens, under the Compact, if reformed voting systems are used by a state. How would IRV be reported by states? States might locally eliminate a candidate under IRV rules and never report the vote totals. The Compact seems to assume a plurality method in each state. The application of this to any other method is problematic. If one state allows Approval voting, as an example, it would not be fair unless all states offered it. Yet the numbers, the "extra votes" would appear in the election results from the state. I don't see an obvious way to report, fairly, the results of any advanced voting method without creating "equal treatment of votes" problems, whether the method is IRV, top-two runoff, or anything else. Top-two runoff, for example, if the runoff is done speedily, would create no problem with the electoral college. But what vote would be reported? Just the top two from the runoff? That would exclude the candidate who comes in first in the state. A third party candidate, under some conditions, within one state, might make it to second place, killing the votes for the national major party candidate in the final "report of votes." Same would happen with Contingent vote "IRV." Given that RRichie's organization FairVote is promoting both NPV and IRV, I wonder how Richie would address this? --Abd (talk) 19:47, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Map color key suggestion

Currently, the "red" set of colors indicate bills which did not pass into law in a given year — but they do not differentiate between states where the bill was killed that year, and states where the bill remained pending after the end of the calendar year (as in states with a 2007-2008 legislative session). My original impression from the map was that the bill was killed in a lot of states in 2007, but a look through the state-by-state status chart shows that 12 of these states carried bills over from 2007 to 2008, and 9 of those bills are still pending today (NJ and IL passed, VT vetoed).

My suggestion is to use the green set of colors for all 12 of these states on the 2007 map (and in future years). The green colors would then represent "pending at the end of the year" (except in the current year, where they would still mean "pending currently"), and the reds would then exclusively mean "killed during that year". It will then become clear at a glance how many states actually killed the bill in a given year. You could always add a third set of colors (yellows?) to indicate bills that remained pending at the end of the year, but my solution would hopefully be visually simpler. — Swpb^{t & c} 14:13, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Your suggestion makes some sense, but the way the table is worded doesn't leave room for weather the bill was killed or remained pending. Fact is, the legislation in those states did not pass in 2007, and therefore they go in the section labeled "Did not pass". I would support using a yellow for states that did not pass in a certain year while the bill itself was still pending, however. Nevermore27 (talk) 10:20, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Yes, obviously the wording would have to be tweaked as well, "Did not pass" would likely become "Killed" — Swpb^{t & c} 13:12, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

I think Swpb makes a good point: the maps don't show whether a bill was pending at the end of a year, or whether it had failed during the year. However, I wouldn't want to add an additional color to the maps. So... I think the challenge is to use green, but find a good way to word it. How about something like this:

Status of NPVIC legislation	December 31, 2006	December 31, 2007	Current status
File:NPVMapKey2.png
Participating states	0	1 (MD)	4 (MD, NJ, IL, HI)
Electoral votes	0 (of 270 needed)	10 (of 270 needed)	50 (of 270 needed)

Szu (talk) 18:00, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

I really like the "Dec. 31, 200X" approach - it presents each map as a snapshot in time, which makes the "pending" label more intuitive. And you've avoided using a label like "killed" or "died", which would probably be too vernacular-sounding. In this setup, one can infer from "did not pass" that the bill died or was vetoed. I think this is an excellent way to present the same map with more information but without sacrificing readability. Kudos! — Swpb^{t & c} 00:33, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Great, I'll put it up!

BTW I'd also been wondering about what happens to these maps on Jan 1 '09... I think shrinking them a little is probably the best option:

Status of NPVIC legislation	December 31, 2006	December 31, 2007	December 31, 2008	Current status
File:NPVMapKey2.png
Participating states	0	1 (MD)	4 (+NJ, IL, HI)	4
Electoral votes	0 (of 270 needed)	10 (of 270 needed)	50 (of 270 needed)	50 (of 270 needed)

Szu (talk) 17:00, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Shrinking would work for 2009, but by 2010 a second row might become necessary. We've got a while before that becomes an issue, though. — Swpb^{t & c} 23:13, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

At some point we will have to ask whether we really want such a detailed history, with a map for every year. We could also show only maps for even years (since no legislative session appears to continue after an even year). However, two years from now, when most of the legislative sessions will again have concluded, the ultimate result of this compact will probably be clear. States will not continue to debate this legislation every single year (or session), I think. --KarlFrei (talk) 08:47, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

A map every two years would be a good idea. I do think (some) states will continue to bring up the bill as circumstances change. For one thing, as more states pass the bill, the likelihood of it coming into effect (and thus the value of debating it in the legislature) changes, and for another, there has been very little in the way of public outreach on the compact thus far, and as it becomes a more mainstream issue, states may become more or less inclined to do something about it. — Swpb^{t & c} 13:47, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

Yeah we'll see how it goes. At least we don't have to worry about it for a while. Szu (talk) 17:45, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

I think the first thing we should get rid of when the time comes is 2006, since nothing passed, and it was hardly introduced anywhere. But like you all said, there's a bit of time before we have to worry about that. Nevermore27 (talk) 03:50, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

I disagree. To simply remove 2006 would give the impression that 2007 was the first year in which the bill was introduced. The fact that little activity occurred in the first year of NPV's effort is itself a notable fact. If we are going to have maps tracking the compact's progress, we have to include the entire life of that process. — Swpb^{t & c} 02:50, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Dammit, you're right. Well forget I ever said that. Nevermore27 (talk) 07:57, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

"Electoral strength"

For the caption of the diagram, can someone in the know please clarify whether this means electoral college votes or popular votes? I couldn't find it anywhere. Thanks. --Padraic 14:23, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Another map question: does the light pink (passed both houses but failed) mean the bill was vetoed? Or is there some other way a passed bill can fail? Please clarify for non-American readers. --Padraic 14:29, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Electoral strength represents electoral votes - a larger state in the second image has more votes, and a 'stronger' presence than other states. Light pink means that it was vetoed by the governor: Either the governor vetoed it and the legislature either opted not to or failed to override the veto with a 2/3 vote, or the bill was 'pocket vetoed', in that the governor did not return the bill in time for an override to be attempted before the legislature ended their session. The 'pink' cases are California's first attempt, which was vetoed, Hawai'i's first attempt, where the lower house failed to override the veto, and Vermont, where it was vetoed. --uǝʌǝsʎʇɹoɟʇs(st47) 15:12, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Since a "pocket veto" is not technically a veto, the pink is not strictly synonymous with "vetoed". — Swpb^{τ • c} 22:45, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Constitutionality

I don't know. The way this section is written seems to name drop more than describe what the conflict there actual is. And just because a few experts say something is constitutional doesn't make it so (Milgram experiment, anyone?). The USSC has ruled on this in the past in other instances, but those compacts never had such far-reaching consequences as this would. They are likely to be inclinced to rule against it, especially with the collectively conservative stance of the Court. Again, Congress could give thumbs up and then that's that... Foofighter20x (talk) 13:09, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:National Popular Vote Interstate Compact/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

GA review (see here for criteria)

1. It is reasonably well written.

   a (prose): b (MoS):

2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.

   a (references): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR):

3. It is broad in its coverage.

   a (major aspects): b (focused):

4. It follows the neutral point of view policy.

   Fair representation without bias:

5. It is stable.

   No edit wars etc.:

6. It is illustrated by images, where possible and appropriate.

   a (images are tagged and non-free images have fair use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):

7. Overall:

   Pass/Fail:

   An excellent article, and the work put in since the first GA review certainly shows. I really have only one minor concern, which is not enough for me to hold off on passing the article: The state-by-state chart is inconsistent in how status is displayed. Some states where the bill has only been introduced lists the status as either "red/not voted on" or "yellow/pending". They should consistently be one or the other. Regards, Resolute 19:10, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

Thank you very much for reviewing (and passing :-) ) this article. Regarding the issue you point out, the status is actually pending for states where the bill might still be passed. The status is red if the legislative session is closed, meaning that the bill definitely cannot be passed anymore (unless it is reintroduced in the next session, of course). --KarlFrei (talk) 21:17, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

That makes sense. It might be helpful to note that below the chart, imo. Resolute 21:48, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

Updating 2008 legislative action

The North Carolina bill is dead for the year, as the session has ended. RRichie (talk) 13:27, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! --KarlFrei (talk) 14:13, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

To 138.162.128.55

A lack of board members who fit your definition of "conservative" does not make FairVote "left-wing." Has FairVote endorsed "left-wing" candidates or political parties? Has FairVote stated "left-wing" positions on a range of political issues? If so then you might have a case.

Szu (talk) 20:55, 25 July 2008 (UTC)