Letter: Reforms needn’t involve changes to Constitution

Saturday, Dec. 2, 2000 | 10:04 a.m.

Were it not for this system, which subordinates the recognition of a national popular vote majority to the recognition of each state as an electoral entity, the confusion we are witnessing in Florida would be magnified 50 times. Imagine the number of lawyers and the corresponding chaos we would have to deal with if every precinct in the nation had to be recounted to determine who won.

That we can in rare cases, such as the George W. Bush-Al Gore contest, produce a president who has lost the popular vote by a minute fraction of one percent is a small price to pay for the protection and stability of the electoral vote system. After all, the most inspired insight of the framers of our Constitution was not their belief in majority rule, it was their realization that there are many instances in which the absolute rule of the majority is not the best measure of a just society. The occasional aberrational product of the electoral vote system is not inconsistent with that insight.

This election should lead us to a few needed reforms, which would not require changing the Constitution. For president, our only officer elected nationally, we should have an entirely separate and uniform ballot and separate ballot boxes (whether such boxes are physical or electronic). These ballots should be counted separately, and no report of their tallies should be permitted until the last polling station in the latest time zone finally closes.

C.H. MCCREA SR.