Commentary
National Popular Vote is national divorce, initiated by California
Blue-state plot to select the president is California-based and rooted in sour grapes
The origins of National Popular Vote are found in sour grapes, and its roots are from California. | Shutterstock
When I say “Don’t California my Michigan,” as applied to the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, I’m speaking literally and seriously. From its origins to its organization to its funding, National Popular Vote is the brainchild of Californians.
National Popular Vote, Inc. was created in California in 2006, per a 2019 report from the Congressional Research Service.
The National Popular Vote movement has its origins in the 2000 presidential Election, when George W. Bush beat Al Gore despite getting fewer votes. The movement started years later, and saw a revival after 2016, when Donald Trump won the presidency despite coming up short in the popular vote.
What had been an historical anomaly — the candidate with fewer popular votes winning the presidency due to winning the Electoral College — had now happened two times in five elections. Most people understood that the system is the system, and that changing it is a heavy lift. Electoral College reform never made headway.
But a group of Californians stomped on sour grapes and emerged with a workaround: National Popular Vote. This allows for direct election of the president and pursues it via an interstate compact rather than a constitutional amendment. It’s a bad idea but a clever maneuver.
When America moved to direct election of senators, that took a constitututional amendment. Both Congress and the U.S. Supreme Court will likely be called to weigh on the legality of the extraconstitutional scheme.
Before that happens, lawmakers in states like Michigan still have time to choose sanity. In the name of “one person, one vote,” in-state voters would be disenfranchised by National Popular Vote.
Rather than be the deciding factor in Michigan, the Michigan vote tally would be reduced to a tiebreaker, only invoked in the event of a nationwide tie. As a tie between 150 million voters is highly unlikely, the Michigan vote tally would be rendered meaningless. That’s not “one person, one vote,” that’s a two-seat Democratic majority deciding that the votes of Californians matter more than those of Michiganders.
As the 2019 report reads:
Member state legislatures would then appoint the slate of electors pledged to the nationwide popular vote winner. They would do this regardless of who won the popular vote in their state.
This carries danger, in two ways. When the voters of a state find their will overturned by Californians, they’ll lose faith in government. They’ll come to believe their votes don’t matter. America struggles with voter turnout as it is. National Popular Vote would send all the wrong signals.
And what about the states that aren’t in the compact? How likely is it they stand idly by and watch the blue states conspire to take the presidency for themselves?
How long can a nation act as two separate countries without actually separating? If National Popular Vote takes effect, we will find out. National Popular Vote is national divorce, initiated by California.
Take bad ideas seriously. One day they’re the talk of the faculty lounge, the next they’re published in a little-read journal. Two decades later they’re the law of the land.
National Popular Vote hopes to follow that trajectory. The best defense is telling people exactly what it does.
James David Dickson is managing editor of Michigan Capitol Confidential. Email him at dickson@mackinac.org.
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National Popular Vote is national divorce, initiated by California
Blue-state plot to select the president is California-based and rooted in sour grapes
When I say “Don’t California my Michigan,” as applied to the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, I’m speaking literally and seriously. From its origins to its organization to its funding, National Popular Vote is the brainchild of Californians.
National Popular Vote, Inc. was created in California in 2006, per a 2019 report from the Congressional Research Service.
The National Popular Vote movement has its origins in the 2000 presidential Election, when George W. Bush beat Al Gore despite getting fewer votes. The movement started years later, and saw a revival after 2016, when Donald Trump won the presidency despite coming up short in the popular vote.
What had been an historical anomaly — the candidate with fewer popular votes winning the presidency due to winning the Electoral College — had now happened two times in five elections. Most people understood that the system is the system, and that changing it is a heavy lift. Electoral College reform never made headway.
But a group of Californians stomped on sour grapes and emerged with a workaround: National Popular Vote. This allows for direct election of the president and pursues it via an interstate compact rather than a constitutional amendment. It’s a bad idea but a clever maneuver.
When America moved to direct election of senators, that took a constitututional amendment. Both Congress and the U.S. Supreme Court will likely be called to weigh on the legality of the extraconstitutional scheme.
Before that happens, lawmakers in states like Michigan still have time to choose sanity. In the name of “one person, one vote,” in-state voters would be disenfranchised by National Popular Vote.
Rather than be the deciding factor in Michigan, the Michigan vote tally would be reduced to a tiebreaker, only invoked in the event of a nationwide tie. As a tie between 150 million voters is highly unlikely, the Michigan vote tally would be rendered meaningless. That’s not “one person, one vote,” that’s a two-seat Democratic majority deciding that the votes of Californians matter more than those of Michiganders.
As the 2019 report reads:
This carries danger, in two ways. When the voters of a state find their will overturned by Californians, they’ll lose faith in government. They’ll come to believe their votes don’t matter. America struggles with voter turnout as it is. National Popular Vote would send all the wrong signals.
And what about the states that aren’t in the compact? How likely is it they stand idly by and watch the blue states conspire to take the presidency for themselves?
How long can a nation act as two separate countries without actually separating? If National Popular Vote takes effect, we will find out. National Popular Vote is national divorce, initiated by California.
Take bad ideas seriously. One day they’re the talk of the faculty lounge, the next they’re published in a little-read journal. Two decades later they’re the law of the land.
National Popular Vote hopes to follow that trajectory. The best defense is telling people exactly what it does.
James David Dickson is managing editor of Michigan Capitol Confidential. Email him at dickson@mackinac.org.
Michigan Capitol Confidential is the news source produced by the Mackinac Center for Public Policy. Michigan Capitol Confidential reports with a free-market news perspective.
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