During the election I picked up a book, I thought some fiction would help distract me. I started 1876 by Gore Vidal, he has written a series of historical novels, many about the USA.
So I proceeded to read 1876, it had some familiar names I had seen before in another book, 'Empire' unfortunately in the wrong order. And then, towards the end of the book, guess what happened? A General Election! One remarkably similar to the election Bush 'won' from Gore!
Tilden(Dem) and Hayes(Rep) both thought Tilden had won, based on the popular vote. The result in the Electoral College was in question because the states of Florida, Louisiana, and South Carolina each sent two sets of Electoral Votes to Congress.
Republicans had taken over the state governments in the South after the civil war (1865), but were unpopular with the overwhelmingly Democratic white southerners, many of whom resented what they perceived as interference from the North and blamed the Republicans for the Civil War. Republicans then were almost universally preferred by the South's newly enfranchised black voters. Both sides claimed victory though the Democratic claim was tainted by violence and the Republican by fraud.
The first contested election was that of 1800 when both Thomas Jefferson and his running mate, Aaron Burr, received 73 electoral votes, throwing the election into the House of Representatives. (After 36 ballots, the House chose Jefferson.) The consequence of the 1800 election was the 12th Amendment, providing that electors vote separately for president and vice-president.
The 1824 election saw a four-way split of electoral votes, with the House eventually choosing John Quincy Adams as president even though Andrew Jackson had received more electoral votes.
The 1876 election was a true mess, with disputes over which slates of electors had won in four different states. The final determination as to which slates of electors had in fact been elected was made on an 8-7 vote by a congressional commission. The commission's decision gave Rutherford Hayes 185 electoral votes and the presidency. The winner of the popular vote, Samuel Tilden, finished with 184 electoral votes.
In 1888, Republican Benjamin Harrison lost the popular vote to Grover Cleveland, but won narrowly in the Electoral College.
Then, in 2000, trouble brewed again when electoral victory hinged upon a terribly close and challenged fight for Florida's 25 electoral votes. The fight for Florida's votes went twice to the U. S. Supreme Court. It ended up with the five most conservative members of the Florida Court handing the presidency to George W. Bush.
A solution to this odd form of democracy is the National Popular Vote bill. In 2007, Maryland became the first state to enact the bill, then Hawaii, Illinois, and Virginia. Republicans have been skeptical of the National Popular Vote Bill because many "red" states are rural and have smaller populations (giving them disproportionate power in the Electoral College.
Watching the ConDem manoeuvres of the last few days, its interesting to see how other countries do it.
In looking up some of the data above, I found a few other interesting sites.
This website claims the more syllables in the name the candidate has, the more likely to win. It cites 28 Vs 12 cases in the USA.
While a local Green Blogger looks at the position on the ballot paper, a name beginning with A will be at the top, and so seen first. The statistical evidence points to a small advantage, 264 votes in a constituency. I am not about to change my name to get a few more votes.
This website compares how the GE would have looked under different systems. I have copied the data for the South East below.
FIRST PAST THE POST
Con Lab LD Other
75 4 4 1
ALTERNATIVE VOTE (AV)
Con Lab LD Other
74 4 5 1
ALTERNATIVE VOTE PLUS (AV+)
Con Lab LD Other
63 3 4 1
SINGLE TRANSFERABLE VOTE (STV)
Con Lab LD Other
50 11 23
All but STV would predict a Green Vote. But STV gives more votes to the LibDems.
I wonder which system the LD prefer?
6 years ago
