The Electoral College and Proportional Representation

Recently there’s been a bit of a hubbub in the media over attempts by Republican legislators in a number of states – including my own Wisconsin – to change the way their Electoral College votes [EVs] are allocated.

Of the 51 geopolitical entities (50 states plus D.C.) that are allowed Electoral College votes, 49 of them use a winner-take-all system where the winner of the popular vote in that state takes all of that state’s EVs. However, Maine and Nebraska use a system where their EVs are divided into two classes. Remember that a state is allocated a number of EVs equal to their representation in Congress. Thus, every state has two EV because each state has two senators and at least one EV because every state gets at least one representative in the House. So every state, no matter how small, gets at least 3 EV. The District of Columbia also gets 3 EV even though it is not a state thanks to the 26th Amendments. D.C., however, is capped at 3 EV no matter what it would have if it were a state.

So, Maine and Nebraska divide their EVs into a class based on House of Representative disctricts [representative EVs] and a class of two senatorial EVs. In presidential elections in these states, the winner of the popular vote in each congressional district gets the EV associated with that district and the winner of the state-wide popular votes wins the two senatorial EVs. In practice, this has only led to one split delegation when, in 2008, Barack Obama won one EV in Nebraska (the Omaha district) while John McCain won the other two congressional EVs and the two senatorial EVs.

I have previously discussed how one of the great flaws in our system is the gerrymandering of House districts and the resulting entrenchment of one party-dominated districts and the disenfranchisement of supporters of other political parties in those districts. Under the Maine/Nebraska [ME/NE] system, gerrymandering would become a far more powerful, and dangerous, flaw.

So why are these other states even considering the ME/NE method? Because if it had been in place nationwide, Mitt Romney would have won the 2012 Presidential election. Even if it weren’t nationwide, if only certain key states – Florida, Virginia, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Iowa, and Minnesota – had used such a system, then neither candidate would have received a majority in the Electoral College and the winner would have been decided by the House of Representatives which would have also resulted in President Romney.

And while such a change would be perfectly constitution, the media has rightfully been making a stink about this as a clear example of the losers deciding to change the rules rather than recognizing their failure as a political party. But what bugs me is how the media keeps referring to this as “proportional representation” when the ME/NE system is really a first-past-the-post system. In a truly proportional representation system, a state’s EVs would be divvied out in proportion to the amount of support a candidate received over the whole state. Pennsylvania considered changing over to a true proportional system a few years ago, but ultimately rejected it.

So how would a truly proportional system have looked like this last election?

Here’s a chart with the raw data. I took the percentage of the popular vote a candidate won and multiplied it to get their raw percentage of the EV they won. Then, using normal rules of round, I rounded this percentage to give the final EV Total.

State	Total EV	Obama %	O-EV	Obama Rounded	Romney %	R-EV	Romney Rounded
AL	9	38.36	3.4524	3	60.55	5.4495	6
AK	3	40.81	1.2243	1	54.80	1.644	2
AZ	11	44.59	4.9049	5	53.65	5.9015	6
AR	6	36.88	2.2128	2	60.57	3.6342	4
CA	55	60.24	33.132	33	37.12	20.416	20
CO	9	51.49	4.6341	5	46.13	4.1517	4
CT	7	58.06	4.0642	4	40.73	2.8511	3
DE	3	58.61	1.7583	2	39.98	1.1994	1
DC	3	90.91	2.7273	3	7.28	0.2184	0
FL	29	50.01	14.5029	15	49.13	14.2477	14
GA	16	45.48	7.2768	7	53.30	8.528	9
HI	4	70.55	2.822	3	27.84	1.1136	1
ID	4	32.62	1.3048	1	64.53	2.5812	3
IL	20	57.6	11.52	12	40.73	8.146	8
IN	11	43.93	4.8323	5	54.13	5.9543	6
IA	6	51.99	3.1194	3	46.18	2.7708	3
KS	6	37.99	2.2794	2	59.71	3.5826	4
KY	8	37.80	3.024	3	60.49	4.8392	5
LA	8	40.58	3.2464	3	57.78	4.6224	5
ME	4	56.27	2.2508	2	40.98	1.6392	2
MD	10	61.97	6.197	6	35.90	3.596	4
MA	11	60.65	6.6715	7	37.51	4.1261	4
MI	16	54.21	8.6736	9	44.71	7.1536	7
MN	10	52.65	5.265	5	44.96	4.496	5
MS	6	43.79	2.674	3	55.29	3.3174	3
MO	10	44.38	4.438	4	53.76	5.376	5
MT	3	41.70	1.251	1	55.35	1.6605	2
NE	5	38.03	1.9015	2	59.80	2.99	3
NV	6	52.36	3.1416	3	45.68	2.7408	3
NH	4	51.98	2.0792	2	46.40	1.856	2
NJ	14	58.34	8.1676	8	40.62	5.6364	6
NM	5	52.99	2.6495	3	42.84	2.142	2
NY	29	63.32	18.3628	18	35.19	10.2051	10
NC	15	48.35	7.2525	7	50.39	7.5585	8
ND	3	38.70	1.161	1	58.32	1.7496	2
OH	18	50.67	9.1206	9	47.69	8.5842	9
OK	7	33.23	2.3261	2	66.77	4.6739	5
OR	7	54.24	3.7968	4	42.15	2.9505	3
PA	20	51.97	10.394	10	46.59	9.318	9
RI	4	62.70	2.508	3	35.24	1.4096	1
SC	9	44.09	3.9681	4	54.56	4.9104	5
SD	3	39.87	1.1961	1	57.89	1.7367	2
TN	11	39.08	4.2988	4	59.48	6.5428	7
TX	38	41.38	15.7244	16	57.17	21.7246	22
UT	6	24.75	1.485	2	72.79	4.3674	4
VT	3	66.57	1.9971	2	30.97	0.9291	1
VA	13	51.16	6.6508	7	47.28	6.1464	6
WA	12	56.16	6.7392	7	41.29	4.9548	5
WV	5	35.54	1.777	2	62.30	3.115	3
WI	10	52.83	5.283	5	45.89	4.589	5
WY	3	27.82	0.8346	1	68.64	2.0592	2
				272			261

As you can see, President Obama would have still won with 272 electoral votes to Mitt Romney’s 261. A razor thin victory, but a victory nonetheless.

But there are some interesting problems that arose from this exercise.

First, in Alabama, strictly sticking to rules of rounding would have led to Obama winning 4 EV instead of 3 which would have given Alabama a total EV of 10 rather than 9. So, I erred in favor of the candidate that won the majority.

Second, in California, Missouri, New York, and Pennsylvania some EVs are missing from the total of Obama and Romney. This is obviously the result of votes cast for third-party candidates, but no single third-party candidate in any of those states won enough of the vote to merit having a full EV. So what do we do with these “missing” EVs?

State	EV	O + R	Missing
CA	55	53	-2
MO	10	9	-1
NY	29	28	-1
PA	20	19	-1

Third, in states with an even number of EVs, a near tie – such as in Ohio – results in an even split while in a state with an odd number of EVs – such as Florida – a near-tie actually gives the overall winner an extra EV.

State	Total EV	Obama %	O-EV	Obama Rounded	Romney %	R-EV	Romney Rounded
FL	29	50.01	14.5029	15	49.13	14.2477	14
OH	18	50.67	9.1206	9	47.69	8.5842	9

Fourth, in large states, the percentage of votes needed to earn an EV is far lower than in small states. For instance, in California, a candidate needs 1.819% of the total vote to earn an elector. But, in Wyoming, a candidate needs 33.34% to earn an elector. Thus, third-party candidates would far better in larger states than in small ones.

One solution to these four problems would be to increase the number of electors by some multiplier such as five, ten, twenty, or even one hundred. But any increase in the total number of electors would increase the chance that no single candidate would win a majority of electors throwing the Presidential election to the House of Representatives to decide. Keep in mind that in such a situation, each state delegation votes within itself and each state gets one vote. Meanwhile, the Vice-President would be selected by the Senate with each Senator voting individually. What a mess.

Still, just remember that whenever anyone calls the Maine/Nebraska system “proportional” they’re simply wrong.