Voting Rights: Georgia lawmakers want to let popular vote decide presidential elections
Several Georgia state lawmakers plan to push legislation that would allow the popular vote -- rather than the Electoral College -- decide who wins presidential elections.
State Sen. Nan Orrock (D-Atlanta) and Rep. Stephanie Stuckey-Benfield (D-Atlanta) announced the legislation this week as members of the Electoral College met across the country to formally cast the ballots that will elect Barack Obama president.
"The current system of electing the President is outdated and needs to be changed," Sen. Nan Orrock said at a press conference. "It should be very simple; the candidate who receives the most votes throughout all 50 states should always win the presidential election."
Such proposals have passed one legislature house in about 20 states so far.
According to the Atlanta-Journal Constitution:
"Now is the time to move popular-vote legislation onto the front burner," Orrock said at the press conference. "This is a nonpartisan issue. This is an issue about expanding democracy."
State Sen. Nan Orrock (D-Atlanta) and Rep. Stephanie Stuckey-Benfield (D-Atlanta) announced the legislation this week as members of the Electoral College met across the country to formally cast the ballots that will elect Barack Obama president.
"The current system of electing the President is outdated and needs to be changed," Sen. Nan Orrock said at a press conference. "It should be very simple; the candidate who receives the most votes throughout all 50 states should always win the presidential election."
Such proposals have passed one legislature house in about 20 states so far.
According to the Atlanta-Journal Constitution:
The movement gained steam in 2000, when Democrat Al Gore won the popular vote but Republican George W. Bush won the Electoral College.The lawmakers pointed to a recent study by an electoral research group called FairVote that showed:
Orrock and Stuckey-Benfield said many states are ignored by presidential candidates because they are thought to be in the bag for one of the parties.
Typically battleground states, such as Ohio and Florida, get much of the attention from candidates because their electoral votes are up in the air. In a winner-take-all system, a candidate who carries the popular vote in a state gets all the electoral votes.
- 98 percent of the campaign events involving the 2008 presidential or vice presidential candidates occurred in 15 "battleground states."
- Over half of the events were in just four states: Ohio, Florida, Pennsylvania and Virginia.
"Now is the time to move popular-vote legislation onto the front burner," Orrock said at the press conference. "This is a nonpartisan issue. This is an issue about expanding democracy."
