[EM] In defense of the Electoral College (was Re: Making a Bad Thing Worse)

[Dave Ketchum]

On Sat, 08 Nov 2008 18:45:38 +0100 Kristofer Munsterhjelm wrote:
> Dave Ketchum wrote:
> 
>> On Fri, 07 Nov 2008 09:58:30 +0100 Kristofer Munsterhjelm wrote:
> 
> 
>>> I think an NPV-style gradual change would have a greater chance of 
>>> succeeding than would a constitutional amendment. The constitutional 
>>> amendment requires a supermajority, and would thus be blocked by the 
>>> very same small states that benefit from the current Electoral College.
>>
>>
>> An NPV style change MIGHT have a greater chance than an amendment but:
>>      It would be incomplete.
>>      Small states could resist for the same reason.
> 
> 
> If the small states resist, the large and middle sized states will 
> attain a majority, and thus through the compact/agreement overrule the 
> others. At that point, it'll be in the interest of the small states to 
> join since their share of power by staying outside the system is 
> effectively zero.

If you wander outside the law you can end up in court - a path available to 
the small states if the large states do that - or whoever felt hurt by the 
NPV agreement.
> 
>> Note that small states could retain their advantage with an amendment 
>> -- as I proposed.  What might all states compromise on?
> 
> 
> That would depend on the nature of the agreement. Either it would be 
> straight NPV (all states weighted by population) or it would be 
> according to current (EC) weighting.
> 
> For an amendment, it's possible that small states would oppose the 
> amendment if it's population-normalized, whereas large states would 
> oppose it if it was electoral-college-normalized.

Which means, as in many disagreements, a compromise would make sense.
> 
>>> As for the system of such a compact, we've discussed that earlier. I 
>>> think the idea of basing it on a Condorcet matrix would be a good 
>>> one. That is, states produce their own Condorcet matrices, and then 
>>> these are weighted and added together to produce a national Condorcet 
>>> matrix, which is run through an agreed-upon Condorcet method.
>>
>>
>> How do we tolerate either weight or not weight without formal 
>> agreement (amendment)?
> 
> 
> I imagine a clause like: "The maximum power of a state shall be its 
> population, as a fraction of the population of all states within the 
> compact. Call this power p. The state shall be free to pick an x so that 
> the weighting for this state is p * x, 0 <= x <= 1". That's for the 
> closest thing to NPV. For a continuous electoral college, the first 
> sentence would be "The maximum power of a state shall be the sum of its 
> number of representatives and senators, divided by the sum of the number 
> of representatives and senators for all states within the compact". 
> There's no reason to have x < 1 but for future agreements to mutually 
> diminish power (to turn an EC compact into a population-normalized one 
> or vice versa).
> 
> I'll add that this phrasing would give states the same power no matter 
> the relative turnout. If that's not desired, it could be rephrased 
> differently, but giving states the same power is closer to the current 
> state of things. The continuous electoral college variant does not take 
> into account the 23rd Amendment, either.

Ugh.
> 
>>> If all states use Plurality, well, the results are as in Plurality. 
>>> If some use Condorcet, those have an advantage, and if some want to 
>>> use cardinal weighted pairwise, they can do so. Yet it's technically 
>>> possible to use any method that produces a social ordering (by 
>>> submitting, if there are n voters and the social ordering is A>B>C, 
>>> the Condorcet matrix corresponding to "n: A>B>C"). While imperfect, 
>>> and possibly worse than Plurality-to-Condorcet or simple Condorcet 
>>> matrix addition, the option would be there, and would be better than 
>>> nothing.
>>
>>
>> Actually each state does only the first step of Condorcet - the NxN array:
>>      If a state does Condorcet, that is exact.
>>      If a state does Plurality, conversion as if voters did bullet 
>> voting in Condorcet is exact.
>>      If a state does something else, it has to be their responsibility 
>> to produce the NxN array.
> 
> 
> Yes. What I'm saying is that it's theoretically possible to incorporate 
> any voting method into this; however, the results might be suboptimal if 
> you try to aggregate, say, IRV results this way, since you'd get both 
> the disadvantages of IRV and Condorcet (nonmonotonicity for the former 
> and LNH* failure for the latter, for instance).

IRV is a distraction since such ballots could and should be counted as 
Condorcet.

Should be a method that at least tries for a result based on comparative 
strength of candidates.
> 
>> States have differing collections of candidates:
>>      In theory, could demand there be a single national list.  More 
>> practical to permit present nomination process, in case states desire 
>> such.
>>      Thus states should be required to prepare their NxN arrays in a 
>> manner that permits exact merging with other NxN arrays, without 
>> having to know what candidates may be in the other arrays.
> 
> 
> The easiest way to do this is probably to have the candidates sorted (by 
> name or some other property, doesn't really matter). When two matrices 
> with different entries are joined, expand the result matrix as 
> appropriate. Since the candidate indices are sorted, there'll be no 
> ambiguity when joining (unless two candidates have the same names, but 
> that's unlikely).

Two candidates with the same name is a problem to solve regardless of method.

Sorting could be part of the joining, but I demand the results be exactly 
the same as if the ballots had been counted into the final matrix.  Doable, 
but takes a bit of planning.
-- 
  davek at clarityconnect.com    people.clarityconnect.com/webpages3/davek
  Dave Ketchum   108 Halstead Ave, Owego, NY  13827-1708   607-687-5026
            Do to no one what you would not want done to you.
                  If you want peace, work for justice.