Don't neuter Electoral College

Voters at least should have a say

Monday, January 22, 2007

Like a bad penny, high-handed ideas that try to eliminate the relevance of the Electoral College without first amending the U.S. Constitution keep coming back.

For a second straight year, a proposal in the state legislature would lasso Colorado electors into a scheme that could force them to cast their ballots for the presidential candidate who gets the most popular votes nationwide, even if a majority of Coloradans had chosen a different nominee.

And though the self-styled democrats behind this move claim they want the presidential vote to represent "the will of the people," the people will not be allowed to decide whether Colorado joins this stealthy plot.

Any attempt to change the way Coloradans express their preference for president should at a minimum be decided by voters in the form of an initiative or a referendum. Instead, Senate Bill 46 would thwart that option by letting legislators rather than the people mandate how presidential electors will vote.

Proposed amendments to the Constitution must first receive a two-thirds majority vote in both the U.S. House and the Senate. Then three-fourths of state legislatures must endorse them.

Those procedures are by design, and explain why the Constitution has been amended a mere 17 times after the Bill of Rights was ratified. The founders did not want the nation's supreme governing document modified in a frenzy, without first subjecting such proposals to a public, nationwide debate.

Now awaiting a vote on the Senate floor, SB 46, by Majority Leader Ken Gordon, D-Denver, would in effect short-circuit that time-tested mechanism. It would commit Colorado electors to support the national popular vote winner. But the bill would take effect only after states with at least 270 electoral votes, a majority of the college, had passed similar bills.

Since the 11 most populous states control 271 electoral votes, a handful of legislatures across the country could pull off this constitutional end-run without going to the trouble of formally amending the Constitution.

The Electoral College is "undemocratic" by design. If the president were elected by a simple majority vote, a candidate might win the White House by campaigning in a handful of metropolitan areas primarily on the coasts . . . and treat inland areas like Colorado as a nuisance, merely a fly-over region.

So yes, the Electoral College does give less populated states a slight disproportionate advantage. But it also tends to force presidential candidates to develop programs with national appeal. That's healthy for our civic culture.

The Rocky has flirted with the notion of moving to a direct popular vote for president. But we cannot support this proposal. And we would certainly hope that any such effort would be fully and publicly debated.

SB 46 has the potential of disenfranchising Coloradans to serve a cause that purports to promote democracy. It deserves a resounding thumbs-down from the Legislature.