http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/08/09/ ... index.htmlNN) -- A GOP-inspired effort to tinker with the Electoral College machinery in California is raising alarm bells among Democrats who fear it could doom the party's chances of winning the White House in 2008.
A GOP-led group submitted a proposal to state Attorney General Jerry Brown that could sway the '08 presidential race.
Democrats have come to rely on California's block of 55 electoral votes -- the largest haul available in any state -- as part of their arithmetic to win the presidency with a majority in the Electoral College.
A group called Californians for Equal Representation has submitted a ballot initiative to state Attorney General Jerry Brown that would change the current statewide winner-take-all system to a formula based on congressional districts.
Republicans say the idea is aimed at attracting presidential candidates to campaign in California, which they rarely do because the statewide vote traditionally leans Democratic. Opponents call the proposal an attempt to grab Democratic votes.
Under the proposal, the winning candidate in each of the state's 53 congressional districts would get one electoral vote, with two votes going to the statewide winner.
Supporters want to put the proposal on the ballot for next June's state primary, which would put the change into effect for the 2008 election.
Do to so, supporters will have to collect about 434,000 petition signatures from registered voters by November 13, according to the secretary of state's office.
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In the 2006 election, Californians elected 34 Democrats and 19 Republicans to the House.
Had the proposed system been in effect in 2004, President Bush would have captured 22 of California's electoral votes. The extra electoral votes would have eliminated Bush's need to carry the pivotal state of Ohio to win re-election.
"This would all but guarantee that the Republican nominee would get 20 extra Electoral College votes, which could certainly impact the outcome of the election," said Allan Hoffenblum, a Republican strategist.
And that is exactly what has Democrats crying foul.
"The Republicans are doing this in California because they want a chunk of our vote," said Darry Sragow, a Democratic strategist.
The ballot initiative was submitted by Thomas Hiltachk, a Sacramento election lawyer who is also general counsel for Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
The purpose of the change is to make California more relevant in presidential elections by forcing candidates to campaign in the state, according to the initiative.
"Because this is a reliable Democratic state, none of the presidential candidates -- Republican or Democrat -- ever shows up in California," Hoffenblum said.
On the other side of the divide, Democrats argue that California shouldn't make such a change when the vast majority of other states still operate under a winner-take-all system.
"This is very fair if it's universal around the country," Sragow said. "It is patently absurd it if only takes place in certain states."
Under the Constitution, each state gets a number of electoral votes equal to its representation in Congress, including both representatives and senators. Currently, 48 states award all of their electoral votes to the candidate who wins the largest number of votes.
Two states -- Nebraska and Maine -- have adopted the system that is being proposed for California, assigning their electoral votes based on who wins individual congressional districts, with the statewide winner getting the two votes derived from senators. But this has not generated controversy because both states have just a handful of votes, and the results have never resulted in splitting them between candidates.
Ironically, while Democrats are up in arms in California over the idea of changing the Electoral College rules, their compatriots in Republican-leaning North Carolina have floated the idea of adopting the Nebraska-Maine system for their state.
However, national Democratic leaders have tried to discourage that effort, because of concerns it would be difficult to support such a change in North Carolina, where it would help the party, while opposing it in California.
The change also would help Democrats much less in North Carolina than it would hurt in California. In 2004, the Democratic presidential nominee, Sen. John Kerry, would have garnered three more votes in North Carolina, while losing 22 in California.
The disputed 2000 election, in which Bush won the electoral vote while losing the popular vote, has generated a flurry of proposals to abolish or alter the Electoral College, both at the federal and state level.
In 2006, Colorado voters rejected a constitutional amendment that would have divided up the electoral vote pie in proportion to each candidates' share of the popular vote.
A group called National Popular Vote also is lobbying state legislatures to adopt a system where all of a state's electoral votes would be pledged to the winner of the national popular vote -- an idea which, if adopted by states holding a majority of electoral votes, would ensure that the popular vote winner always became president.
While National Popular Vote says its plan has been introduced in 47 states, Maryland is the only one so far to pass it. And the change won't go into effect in Maryland until it gains approval in enough states to ensure that the popular vote winner would take the White House. E-mail to a friend
On the flip side:
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-na ... californiaSACRAMENTO — Democrats on Tuesday proposed putting on a 2008 ballot an initiative aimed at having California join the movement to elect presidents by popular vote.
The initiative, if successful, also would head off a Republican effort to get some of California's electoral votes.
GOP consultants have proposed a separate initiative to change California's winner-take-all system of awarding its 55 electoral votes. Under this measure, electoral votes would be awarded by how congressional districts vote, which could benefit the Republican nominee in this state with more registered Democrats.
If the competing measures make it onto the ballot in June or November, California could become a battleground over the electoral college, whose electors ultimately select the president and vice president. The state has more electoral votes than any other and more than 10% of the electoral college's 538.
Democrats backing the initiative filed Tuesday think that electing presidents by national popular vote would help the their party's nominee win the White House.
"A lot of people who lived through the 2000 election. . . feel pretty strongly that we ought to have a national popular vote," said Democratic consultant Chris Lehane, among those pushing for the measure. "The electoral college is a vestige of another time period."
In 2000, Democrat Al Gore received more of the popular vote than Republican George W. Bush, but failed to garner a majority of the electoral votes. Candidates who placed second in the popular vote also were elected president in 1888, 1876 and 1824.
A team of Democrats filed two virtually identical initiatives with the California attorney general's office Tuesday, a first step to begin gathering the hundreds of thousands of signatures needed to place either measure on the June or November ballot. (One version contains a clause stating that if both the Democratic- and Republican-backed initiatives make it onto the ballot, the one with the most votes would take precedence.)
If backers gather sufficient signatures to place one of the Democratic measures on the ballot, and voters were to approve it, California would become one of roughly a dozen states to have embraced the concept of electing presidents by popular vote.
The national drive toward a popular vote would not scrap the electoral college system, but would require states to award their electoral votes to whichever candidate wins the most actual votes nationally. It would take effect only if states representing a majority of the electoral votes agree to the change.
Although California is a Democratic state, Republicans hold 19 congressional seats, suggesting that the GOP presidential nominee could win at least 19 of the state's electoral votes. A Field Poll released this week showed that the GOP-backed concept was supported by a ratio of 47% to 35%.
There is no definitive count of voter registration by party. Some states don't ask party affiliation. But based on a recent Times/Bloomberg poll, 33% of voters nationally identified themselves as Democrats, 28% said they were Republicans, and the rest said they belonged to minor parties or declined to state.
Kevin Eckery, spokesman for the GOP measure, said the Democratic-backed initiative would leave Californians with little or no voice in U.S. politics. "If you ignore the congressional districts, there would be one big overwhelming national vote," he said. "What matters in L.A. . . . won't matter. It will be just one vote thrown into the mix."
I am so pissed at both parties right now.
