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As long as we're getting rid of monuments to slave owners, (Original Post) vlyons Jun 2020 OP
Ka ching Eliot Rosewater Jun 2020 #1
PERFECT!! leftieNanner Jun 2020 #2
This one deserves wide circulation. Dead-bang perfect. (nt) Paladin Jun 2020 #3
Excellent observation! sop Jun 2020 #4
If only we could make some kind of deal with the red states BannonsLiver Jun 2020 #5
Now, *that* is the best one to get rid of!1 UTUSN Jun 2020 #6
MOVE TO #1 ON THE LIST !!! fierywoman Jun 2020 #7
Bazinga! brush Jun 2020 #8
Cue it up. Looooong overdue. Popular vote, paper trail, scanners that can't be hacked. Evolve Dammit Jun 2020 #9
14th amendment says we can take away electoral votes from some racially oppressive states IronLionZion Jun 2020 #10
This needs to be its own OP! geardaddy Jun 2020 #22
the 14th Amendment unfortunately also created a MASSIVE disenfranchisement tool Celerity Jun 2020 #37
That's why they like to incarcerate people who look like Democrats IronLionZion Jun 2020 #41
Absolutely! niyad Jun 2020 #11
K&R! KPN Jun 2020 #12
Thank you! CountMyVote4Reality Jun 2020 #13
Yes! It's long past time to get rid of the electoral college. crickets Jun 2020 #14
Your wording of question is excellent bobbieinok Jun 2020 #15
When Joe's in the WH & we take the Senate, they'll make sure to kill it KS Toronado Jun 2020 #16
I doubt very much Biden would support such an effort. Kaleva Jun 2020 #24
It will require a constitutional amendment which can drag on for years. nt yellowdogintexas Jun 2020 #33
I sooooooooooooo want to get rid of the Upthevibe Jun 2020 #17
x1000 Capt. America Jun 2020 #44
The EC isn't a monument to slavery FBaggins Jun 2020 #18
Close: The EC was not the compromise. WhiskeyGrinder Jun 2020 #21
We got rid of that monument over a century and a half ago FBaggins Jun 2020 #26
The Electoral College was constructed to give more power to white southerners, out of proportion WhiskeyGrinder Jun 2020 #29
That once again confuses the two "compromises" FBaggins Jun 2020 #31
There have been attempts to abolish the EC IronLionZion Jun 2020 #28
Which is basically what I said FBaggins Jun 2020 #30
If we didn't have that, Putin would have never succeeded. C Moon Jun 2020 #19
NAILED IT! LymphocyteLover Jun 2020 #20
yep, it's a slave era holdover llashram Jun 2020 #23
Boom! lagomorph777 Jun 2020 #25
It doesn't take a constitutional amendment customerserviceguy Jun 2020 #27
Therein Lies The Problem ProfessorGAC Jun 2020 #40
It's not a bug, it's a feature customerserviceguy Jun 2020 #43
Getting rid of monuments to slave owners, you say? Straw Man Jun 2020 #32
NO F*****G S**T!!!! Doreen Jun 2020 #34
BOOM! calimary Jun 2020 #35
Good one! Poiuyt Jun 2020 #36
I wish I'd said that. jaxexpat Jun 2020 #38
Let us know when you have 3/5 of the States in agreement. brooklynite Jun 2020 #39
Adherence to Inertia caused by Structural Bindings will bring down a Nation. MarcA Jun 2020 #42
Well... as long as there is a "list"... I have a suggestion Josiesdad Jun 2020 #45
Brilliant point. zentrum Jun 2020 #46

BannonsLiver

(16,161 posts)
5. If only we could make some kind of deal with the red states
Thu Jun 25, 2020, 12:43 PM
Jun 2020

You can keep your racist statues, and we’ll take something that actually matters — the electoral college.

IronLionZion

(45,250 posts)
10. 14th amendment says we can take away electoral votes from some racially oppressive states
Thu Jun 25, 2020, 01:47 PM
Jun 2020

since they are denying their citizens the right to vote

Section 2. Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the Executive and Judicial officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State.


Section 2 of the Fourteenth Amendment allows for a state's representation in the House of Representatives to be reduced if a state unconstitutionally denies people the right to vote. The reduction is in keeping with the proportion of people denied a vote. This amendment refers to "the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice President of the United States" among other elections, the only place in the Constitution mentioning electors being selected by popular vote.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Electoral_College#Fourteenth_Amendment

Celerity

(42,630 posts)
37. the 14th Amendment unfortunately also created a MASSIVE disenfranchisement tool
Fri Jun 26, 2020, 05:41 AM
Jun 2020
https://eji.org/news/race-voting-and-a-gaping-loophole-a-critical-look-at-the-14th-amendment/

“The Fourteenth Amendment is an amendment that was intended to give formerly enslaved people citizenship,” explained Ryan Haygood, a civil rights lawyer who has litigated landmark challenges to disenfranchisement. “But it was also the same amendment that allowed, expressly, for those rights to be withheld if you were convicted of a crime. That conflict is a function of America at once being a place that has very high ideals of freedom and equality, alongside very low practices that undermine the very things that we say we hold dear.”


Section 2. Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the Executive and Judicial officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State.

IronLionZion

(45,250 posts)
41. That's why they like to incarcerate people who look like Democrats
Fri Jun 26, 2020, 08:59 AM
Jun 2020

ie minorities. We can try to get them on purging voter registrations of people who were not convicted of any crimes but just had a similar name or changed addresses or something innocent like that.

But mostly they really hate the first section of the 14th amendment because it gives me birthright citizenship. No matter how hard they argue about what "real Americans" look like, it doesn't change where I was born.

FBaggins

(26,693 posts)
18. The EC isn't a monument to slavery
Thu Jun 25, 2020, 02:41 PM
Jun 2020

The misconception is usually fueled by so many small-population states being red today and the perception that red states are in some sense more-racist... but the EC was a compromise between large/small population states during the founding era. And those didn't correlate with North/South or slave/free.

FBaggins

(26,693 posts)
26. We got rid of that monument over a century and a half ago
Thu Jun 25, 2020, 03:11 PM
Jun 2020

The OP was about the EC... which was not created to perpetuate slavery.

WhiskeyGrinder

(22,145 posts)
29. The Electoral College was constructed to give more power to white southerners, out of proportion
Thu Jun 25, 2020, 03:29 PM
Jun 2020

to their states' populations. As Madison himself said:

There was one difficulty however of a serious nature attending an immediate choice by the people. The right of suffrage was much more diffusive in the Northern than the Southern States; and the latter could have no influence in the election on the score of the Negroes. The substitution of electors obviated this difficulty and seemed on the whole to be liable to fewest objections.


A racist policy, the 3/5 Compromise, was already in place to apportion seats in Congress, so they might as well apply it to the EC, as well.

Even now, the system hurts Black voters:


https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/11/electoral-college-racist-origins/601918/
Despite black voting patterns to the contrary, five of the six states whose populations are 25 percent or more black have been reliably red in recent presidential elections. Three of those states have not voted for a Democrat in more than four decades. Under the Electoral College, black votes are submerged. It’s the precise reason for the success of the southern strategy. It’s precisely how, as Buckley might say, the South has prevailed.

FBaggins

(26,693 posts)
31. That once again confuses the two "compromises"
Thu Jun 25, 2020, 03:54 PM
Jun 2020

The EC balanced the interests of small vs large states while the 3/5 compromise balanced slave/free... but those aren't the same groups. There were large and small states in both the North and South.

The Madison quote is not related to the characteristic of the EC that gives smaller states relatively more power than the larger ones in selecting the executive (the current objection). He was talking about electors vs direct voting (and in relation to executive re-eligibility, not election). His point is equally valid if the electoral college was apportioned by population alone.




IronLionZion

(45,250 posts)
28. There have been attempts to abolish the EC
Thu Jun 25, 2020, 03:28 PM
Jun 2020

always blocked and filibustered by Dixiecrats and rural conservatives because it benefits them.

FBaggins

(26,693 posts)
30. Which is basically what I said
Thu Jun 25, 2020, 03:36 PM
Jun 2020

The groups that the EC currently helps are not evidence for why it was originally created.

llashram

(6,265 posts)
23. yep, it's a slave era holdover
Thu Jun 25, 2020, 03:02 PM
Jun 2020

and gave us this current disaster-trainwreck of a POTUS even though HRC had almost 3 million more popular votes than the disaster-trainwreck

customerserviceguy

(25,183 posts)
27. It doesn't take a constitutional amendment
Thu Jun 25, 2020, 03:17 PM
Jun 2020

to remove a statue. And an angry mob can't rip the EC out of the Constitution.

All it takes is thirteen states to say, "No, we like the EC the way it is," and it stays. I'm sure there are at least fifteen states that feel that way.

ProfessorGAC

(64,413 posts)
40. Therein Lies The Problem
Fri Jun 26, 2020, 07:32 AM
Jun 2020

I think you're being generous at 15.
Just a quick mental run through of states, I counted 20 that would be unlikely to sign on.
I like the sentiment.
But, I believe it's a pipe dream.

customerserviceguy

(25,183 posts)
43. It's not a bug, it's a feature
Fri Jun 26, 2020, 11:40 AM
Jun 2020

And every time someone bemoans the fact that Wyoming has as many Senators as New York or California, I always reply that Congress voted on accepting new states into the Union on those terms, including Senators of the most populous states.

calimary

(80,693 posts)
35. BOOM!
Fri Jun 26, 2020, 01:17 AM
Jun 2020

"As long as we're getting rid of monuments to slave owners, shouldn't the electoral college also be on the list?"

The Question of the Year, vlyons! Of the last four years, actually.

MarcA

(2,195 posts)
42. Adherence to Inertia caused by Structural Bindings will bring down a Nation.
Fri Jun 26, 2020, 11:28 AM
Jun 2020

Especially when those structures are being used to subvert democracy and justice.

Josiesdad

(43 posts)
45. Well... as long as there is a "list"... I have a suggestion
Sun Jun 28, 2020, 10:36 AM
Jun 2020

If you are familiar with Professor Bogus' famous essay on the History of the Second Amendment (and others) he make a very compelling case that the original intent of adding the right to bear arms to the bill of rights was to entice Madison's home state (Virginia) into ratifying the newly proposed constitution. They were reluctant to get behind it up to that point. Their major concern was that their Slave Patrol (aka State Militia) would, under the new constitution, fall under the control of the federal government and would no longer be their protection against slave revolts. This fear was a very real and long standing in the south in this era and was mentioned prominently ('... HE HAS EXCITED DOMESTIC INSURRECTIONS ...') in our Declaration of Independence.

So... if an argument can be made that the electoral college should be abolished as a vestige enshrined in the constitution to protect the institution of slavery... A much stronger argument can be made that the 2nd amendment's only useful purpose was to protect Slave Owners. It too is an anachronism and should be repealed.

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