By Patrick Rosenstiel
I think most people agree that our presidential election system needs to be reformed.
In New Hampshire, S.B.43 is a bill to replace the state’s winner-take-all system of awarding electoral votes with a system that allocates electors by congressional district. It mimics Maine and Nebraska’s system and does not require a constitutional amendment to be enacted.
The sponsors of S.B.43 and I agree that the shortcomings of the current system present a clear threat to the future of American democracy. The idea of battleground states versus flyover states delivers chaos, instability, and tribalism, and it shakes the very foundation of trust in our national government. Unfortunately, a congressional district system of allocating electoral votes would take a bad system and make it worse.
The real problem with the current system of electing the president is that battleground state voters have all the influence over the outcome of the presidential campaign, and that influence translates to presidents’ agendas as they govern. If voters in the battleground state of Florida want a prescription drug benefit, they get one. If corn farmers in Iowa want an ethanol subsidy, they get it. If rustbelt voters in Pennsylvania and Michigan want tariffs and trade wars, they get them. All this occurs at the expense of voters in flyover states, and a congressional district system would make those transactional policy outcomes even more parochial.
A real danger to democracy exists because of the fact that battleground state voters are hyper-relevant, and flyover state voters completely lack relevance in general election campaigns for president. Ninety-six percent of the 2020 presidential campaign occurred in 12 battleground states. Voters in Michigan, Florida, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania mattered a whole bunch in the outcome, while voters in North Dakota, Texas, Vermont, and Illinois were completely ignored. A congressional district system would narrow the focus even more and render even more voters irrelevant.
The challenge for Electoral College reformers is to embrace a system that advances the principle of one-person one-vote, encourages the candidates to pay attention to the voters of all 50 states and all 435 congressional districts, and ensures the candidate who wins the most popular votes nationwide is elected president—every time.
The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact is the only reform that can deliver on these three principles of reform in time for the 2024 presidential election.
It does not require a constitutional amendment. The bill has passed in 16 jurisdictions containing a total of 196 electoral votes. It will take effect when states totaling 270 electoral votes have passed the bill and joined the compact. It has passed one chamber or another in nine additional states containing a total of 88 electoral votes—more than the 74 needed for the compact to go into effect. It has been supported by Republicans, Democrats, and Independents in multiple state legislatures and nationally. It is an American idea whose time has come.
There is only one way to advance the principle of one-person, one-vote in presidential elections.
There is only one way to encourage the candidates to campaign in all 50 states.
There is only one way to make sure the candidate with the most popular votes nationwide wins the presidency every time.
And there is only one way to ensure every voter in New Hampshire and in every other state is politically relevant in every presidential election.
That one way is for New Hampshire to be among the states with 74 more electoral votes to pass the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact.
Let’s not confuse non-solutions for solutions. Let’s pass the National Popular Vote bill and have a national popular vote for president in 2024. The future of the republic and our precious democracy depends on it.
Patrick Rosenstiel is chairman of the Institute for Research on Presidential Elections, www.irpe.org and senior consultant to National Popular Vote.