On February 3, the California Secretary of State said that Ted Costa’s proposed initiative is now free to begin circulation. It provides that each U.S. House district in California would choose its own presidential elector, similar to the system now used in Nebraska and Maine. The initiative needs 504,760 valid signatures and must be completed by July 5, 2011. Costa is experienced with statewide initiatives and has placed many of them on the ballot in the past. If the initiative gets enough valid signatures, it would probably be voted on at the presidential primary in 2012. It is now impossible to know whether the presidential primary will be in February, March, or June. Current law has it in February but the legislature may change the date.
Ballot Access News
Edited By Richard Winger
Orwell wrote that “All animals are equal, but some animals
are more equal than others”.
In California the 53 congressional districts will be equal
by population. Illegal alien population is not spread around the State of California equally. So in counties with higher illegal alien populations, like Los Angeles
County that county’s electors is more stronger than other
county electors. So it is not one man one vote.
Sincerely, Mark Seidenberg
THE gerrymander petition WILL hopefully generate some action — to ABOLISH the time bomb Electoral College gerrymander system in the U.S.A.
Half the votes in half the gerrymander districts to get a party hack majority of the E.C. votes.
435 + 50 + 3 = at least a mere 488 gerrymander areas for electing a Prez ???
Perhaps divide the States in 2 and D.C. in 3 for more gerrymander areas ???
*******
Save Democracy — Const. Amdt.
ABOLISH the Electoral College.
Uniform definition of Elector in ALL of the U.S.A.
Equal ballot access.
P.R.
Nonpartisan App.V.
Richard Winger,
Does this plan place an additional requirement that the
presidential elector has to reside in the Congressional
District? If so how could the additional requirement be
Constitutional, since it does not address the manner of
selection, but goes to the quilifications to be a member
of the electorial college beyond the terms the party picks.
Sincerely, Mark Seidenberg,
Vice Chairman, American Independent Party
This is the reform needed to perfect our Electoral College system.
Hurray for rational change at last.
What is the EVIL INSANE fixation with subareas in a regime ???
Is a Prez supposed to be the Prez of ALL U.S.A. folks — or just the party hacks in the areas producing 270 Electoral College Votes (of the 538 ECV) ???
Math MADNESS.
This is a nice step towards restoring balance to our electoral system. The size of the House of Representatives was capped in 1913 and it needs to be uncapped in order to give better representation to the people. 650,000 citizens per Congressman? That’s one of the worst ratios of any democratized nation on the planet.
“All politics is local.” GREAT! But that’s a lot of signatures. Best of luck.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/48137501/Barnett-v-Dunn-Judge-Letter-Filed
I would rather California pass an electoral trigger law that would give the electoral college votes to the winner of the popular vote.
Instead of going through the trouble of collecting all those signatures, advocates of this initiative should take an easier route. All they need to do is find a state legislator who is willing to hold the entire budget hostage until his colleagues agree to put the initiative on the ballot.
Hey, it worked for Abel Maldonado and his precious Top Two Primary. I heard not one peep of protest from Top Two advocates about these tactics when he did it. In fact, Jason Olson and his organization Independent Voice endorsed Maldonado for Lieutenant Governor, praising his “courage” in using his “budget vote leverage” to get Prop 14 on the ballot. Using blackmail in the middle of the worst financial crisis qualifies as courage to these people.
Mark Seidenberg, yes, the measure says candidates for presidential elector must live in the district they hope to represent. Also, the US Constitution doesn’t prevent states from setting out statutory rules on who can serve as a presidential elector. Presidential elector is a state office, not a federal office. States generally pay compensation to electors (for travel expenses) out of the state treasury. Also the post office says your postal address is no longer any good, so please let me know a better postal address for you.
Richard Winger
This initiative looks the 3/5 compromise of 1787 has returned, or worst than that.
On October 18, 2010 (last complete date of figures of
registration issue by D. Bowen, California Secertary of
State) the voter registration of the 4th Congressional
District stood at 446,214 (which also had the lowest
illegal alien population in California)*. In contrast
the 28th Congressional Distrtict within Los Angeles County on the same date had registration of only 258,961. This works out that a vote for elector of
President is worth less than 3/5 of a vote for President
in the 4th Congressional District compared to the 28th
Congressional District, viz., 58.035158 %.
*The 4th Congressional District includes all or part of the following counties: Butte, El Dorado, Lassen, Modoc,
Nevada, Placer, Plumas, & Sacramento.
The 3/5 of a person rule was wrong and unfair in the 18th and 19th Century until it was superceded by the
14th Amendment. Now they came up with an unfair plan
to bring a less than 3/5 rule to California for voting for presidential electors.
Lets hope that this plan does not see the light of day.
Remember one full vote for all California elector.
Jim Riley and Richard Winger
I know about Prop. D in San Francisco, letting aliens vote for School Board members. If this thing passes it will let
non-citizens serve as members of the Electorial College and
vote for President and Vice President of these United States.
Please post you views on letting non-citizens serve on the
Electorioal College of California as Electors with the title
of Honorable before there name.
Sincerely, Mark Seidenberg
Vice Chairman, American Independent Party
Sorry.
I was typing the above so fast that I wrote “there” for “their”.
Sincerely, Mark Seidenberg
Vice Chairman, Americxan Independent Party
#13. The proposal would require elector candidates to have been affiliated with their party for 4 preceding years, which would require them to be registered voters, which would in turn require them to be citizens.
It would appear that the proposal would make independent presidential electors, candidates for district office, and therefore subject to higher signature limits, so that a slate of 55 presidential electors would need over 500,000 signatures to qualify.
It would simplify matters to make the office of presidential elector a voter-nominated office, but let an elector candidate indicate which presidential candidate he is pledged to, subject to approval of the presidential candidate.
Dividing a state’s electoral votes by congressional district would magnify the worst features of the Electoral College system. What the country needs is a national popular vote to make every person’s vote equally important to presidential campaigns.
If the district approach were used nationally, it would less be less fair and less accurately reflect the will of the people than the current system. In 2004, Bush won 50.7% of the popular vote, but 59% of the districts. Although Bush lost the national popular vote in 2000, he won 55% of the country’s congressional districts.
The district approach would not cause presidential candidates to campaign in a particular state or focus the candidates’ attention to issues of concern to the state. Under the 48 state-by-state winner-take-all laws(whether applied to either districts or states), candidates have no reason to campaign in districts or states where they are comfortably ahead or hopelessly behind. In North Carolina, for example, there are only 2 districts the 13th with a 5% spread and the 2nd with an 8% spread) where the presidential race is competitive. In California, the presidential race is competitive in only 3 of the state’s 53 districts. Nationwide, there are only 55 “battleground” districts that are competitive in presidential elections. Under the present deplorable 48 state-level winner-take-all system, two-thirds of the states (including California and Texas) are ignored in presidential elections; however, seven-eighths of the nation’s congressional districts would be ignored if a district-level winner-take-all system were used nationally.
Also, a second-place candidate could still win the White House without winning the national popular vote.
A national popular vote is the way to make every person’s vote equal and guarantee that the candidate who gets the most votes in all 50 states becomes President.
#16 When will the MORONS hyping the NPV SCHEME detect in their MORON brains that there is NO uniform definition of Elector in the NPV SCHEME from Hell ???
—
Proper remedy –
Uniform defintion of Elector in ALL of the U.S.A.
Equal ballot access requirements to get on general election ballots — NO primaries, NO runoff primaries.
P.R.
App.V.
Jim Riley
In the first annual message to Congress in 1885, President
Grover Cleveland asseverated that: “The Laws of certain states (California included) … admit a domiciled alien to
local franchise conferring upon him the rights of citizenship
to a degree which places him in the anomalous condition
of being a citizen of a state and yet not of The United States within the purview of Federal and International
Law.”
Last November, the voters of San Francisco defeated Prop. D
with the strong arguments against it by Terence Faulkner
a man I have known for about 44 years. I was even sued by
him. Which he lost.
David Chiu former Acting Mayor of San Francisco who is a
constitutional expert, wrote in the rebuttal to argument
against Prop. D, that: the “California Constitution protects
the rights of citizens to vote, but does not exclude immigrants from voting” and that for “150 years from 1776 to
1926, 22 states (including California) and territories allowed immigrants to vote and even hold office.”
Now we have the “Electorial College Reform Act” which if passed would amend California Election Code section 6905
to remove the restriction of being a citizen of this state,
so aliens, even illegal aliens and those about to be deported, can serve as replacement Presidential Electors
at the California Electorial College meeting in Sacramento
in December, 2012.
Sincerely, Mark Seidenberg, Vice Chairman,
American Independent Party
The current version of 6905 only applies to replacement electors.
What is to stop the American Independent party under Section 7578 from naming persons who are not California citizens as its presidential elector candidates?
Jim Riley
You asked “What is to stop the American Independent party under 7578 from naming persons who are not California citizens as its presidential elector candidates?
Answer is California Election Code section 321, which defines
the tern of art “elector” as used in California Election Code
section 7578 as “person who is a United States citizen 18 years of age or older and a resident of an election precinct
at least 15 days prior to an election.”
That must be read with the 14th Amendement to the Constitution of the United States.
You are incorrect 6905 applies to “Presidential Electors”
in both the current and proposed “Electorial College Reform Act”. Currently the Presidential Electors replacements would
have to be “citizens of this state”. Under the “Electorial College Reform Act” any alien, including illegal aliens
and those about to be deported from the United States, could
be a replacement Presidential Elector to the meeting of the Califoria Electorial College in Sacramento in December, 2012.
Did I answer you question?
Sincerely, Mark Seidenberg
Vice Chairman, American Independent Party
How many citizens of the world (and from outer space) would be voting in CA for Prez/VP of the U.S.A. IF the EVIL party hack robot monsters somehow get NPV enacted ???
Richard Winger
The current California Election Code section 6000 relates
to election code 7578. If the electors of this state vote
the ELECTORIAL COLLEGE REFORM ACT in next year. Section 6000 will govern and take away the rights of American Independent Party State Convention to select its electors as now covered under California Election Code 7578. The AIP has no rules other than California Election Code 7578 to govern the selection of Presidential Electors. The ELECTORIAL COLLEGE REFORM ACT in its proposed version of
section 6000 will strip the American Independent Party of
its selected delegates, because the American Independent Party will conduct its Convention under California Election
Code 7578 and not create rules suggested by the ELECTORIAL
COLLEGE REFORM ACT.
I believe the ELECTORIAL COLEGE REFORM ACT is un-constiutional and un-democratic. It is a violation of the
right of free association. It is telling political parties
in this state that its delegates to the State Convention can not select its nominated presidental
electors at a convention under the terms of a valid section
of the California Election Code, viz., section 7578.
The American Independent Party went through a problem like
this in 1968, when the then California Secretary of State
assisted George C. Walace of Alabama in taking control of
the AIP California Convention away from the delegates to the convention.
If the ELECTORIAL COLLEGE REFORM ACT somehow passes next year
with the NO campaign we are forming, I expected that the issue will end up in court.
Sincerely, Mark Seidenberg,
Vice Chairman, American Independent Party
#20 Elections Code 6900 says that 321 does not apply to presidential electors.
Jim Riley
You are correct section 321 does not apply to section 6900,
but it does apply to does apply to California Election Code
section 7578. The American Independent Party will have to apply CA Election Code section 321, because section 7578 rule the AIP State Convention, not sections 6000 to 6009.
Sincerely, Mark Seidenberg
Vice Chairman, American Independent Party
Jim Riley,
Do you agree with me that the statue (#1477) because of the amendment to California Election Code section 6906
would not last a court review because it is unconstitutional, viz., violating the Habitation Clause
of the 12th Amendment of the Constitution of these United States of America?
Same question for Richard Winger.
Sincerely, Mark Seidenberg
Vice Chairman, American Independent Party
Mr. Seidenberg’s deliberate manipulation of soon to be obsolete figures is quite annoying. He’s fully aware, partially because he has already stated an intention to address the Redistricting Commission, during its public outreach just where new District lines may be moved after the 2010 Census numbers for California are released. Granted, substantial variations between the number of voters between the various Districts will still exist when the final plan is approved by the voters next year. It’s the enumerated population that counts and not the number of voters. Some communities have far higher numbers of unregistered people than others. The reasons are totally irrelevant to the issue of redistricting. Another problem that I see with this initiative is the requirement for each Elector to live in the District that they’re voting for. I expect that all 4 alterntive parties will have some difficulty in filling all 53 District seats. Also, any Independent candidate for President might have the same problem. So there are other factors at work here regarding this initiative.
Charles Deemer
Why are you stating that the figures I gave were obsolete? I gave the last registration figures issue
by the California Secretary of State.
The statute is very poorly drafted, It is unconstitutional on many grounds. I have no idea what
congressional district the AIP party activist live in
nor do I care, since one does not have to live in the
district to run for a seat in the house of represenitves.
I am more concerned about where the funds of the American Independent Party are located after your
term as Treasurer ended on September 2, 2008.
Sincerely, Mark Seidenberg,
Vice Chairman, American Independent Party
This is ridiculous. The U.S. Constitution clearly and explicitly gives the power to choose how electors are chosen to state legislatures and ONLY state legislatures. The people of the state of California simply do not have the authority to change the system by passing a ballot initiative. Period. If we want to do this, it can only be done by a vote of the legislature.
Does no one actually read the Constitution any more?
Andy,
This issue is now over. I was informed by Richard Winger yesterday that Ted Costa will start all over
again with a new entry. But you have a point that needs
to be looked into.
Sincerely, Mark Seidenberg
Vice Chairman, american Independent Party