Electoral Systems Among the Liberal Democracies

ELECTORAL SYSTEMS AMONG THE LIBERAL DEMOCRACIES The Ancient Greek and Roman Electoral Systems Although the American Founding Fathers were distrustful of direct, participatory democracy we should not judge them harshly or impute sinister motives to them. If we view the fate of Socrates at the hands of the democratic jury of Athens as a sample of direct, participatory democracy we can understand why the Founders decided instead to establish a representative system in which the voters would select representatives to govern on their behalf. They left the details of how elections were to be conducted, the qualification of electors, and the like, to the state governments. Expansion of the Franchise in the United States and Britain If we use Samuel P. Huntington's criterion that at least half of the adult population must be allowed to vote in regular, free, competitive elections to select the most important decision-makers the Greek city-states and Rome were never democracies. In seven- teenth century England only persons having a minimum property requirement were allowed to vote for members of the House of Commons. Following Independence the revised state constitution of Virginia required that each voter must own at least 25 acres of settled land "or its town equivalent." Delaware required only that the voter must have paid taxes to the state government in the preceding year. North Carolina allowed taxpayers to vote for its "house of commons" but required ownership of at least 50 acres of land to vote in Senate elections. In the pre-Civil War period in the United States the last property-owning requirements were only lifted in 1824. A "poll tax" was required of voters in some of the post-Reconstruction southern states as a means of preventing African Americans from voting but such taxes were outlawed by the Twenty-Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution ratified on January 23, 1964. In Britain property requirements prevented a majority of adult males from voting until 1885 and were only removed in their entirety in 1918. Women gained the same right to vote as men enjoyed by 1928. Referenda, Plebiscites, and Recall Elections Although it is not practical to use direct participatory democracy to run the administration of any government larger than a small village many nation-states (other than the United States) and several of the state governments within the United States have provisions in their constitutions allowing nation-wide (or state- wide) voting by all eligible voters on proposed changes to a constitution or changes in the statutory law of the national or state government. In states such as Idaho if petitioners can gather 50,000 signatures of Idahoan voters at least six months before a general election they can place a proposed initiative of "state question" on the ballot. If a majority of the voters vote in favor of the initiative it is considered to become part of Idaho's statutory law. In France the President of the Republic can submit proposed amendments to the French constitution to the voters at large for their approval or rejection. Such nation-wide or state-wide exercises in direct participatory democracy are generally known as "referenda" (singular: referendum). The United States does not hold nation-wide referenda on proposed laws or constitutional amendments because the language of Article I, Section 1, "All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives," makes Congress alone the sole legislative authority in the national government. Article V specifies an amendment process that outlines a process for proposal and ratification of constitutional amendments by a process involving representative bodies of the states and of the nation as a whole which precludes direct, popular referenda on amendments to the Constitution. Another type of nation-wide exercise in direct participatory democracy is the "plebiscite." Plebiscites are essentially nation- wide "votes of confidence" (or of no confidence) in a national executive leader. In 1988 the military dictator of Chile, General Augusto Pinochet, allowed the people of Chile to vote in a plebiscite on whether he could remain as Chile's "President for Life." The Chileans overwhelmingly rejected him and, to his credit, he allowed national elections to be held on 11 March 1989 to choose Chile's first democratically-elect President since 1970. When the President of the French Republic submits a proposed amendment to a national referendum this is also regarded as a plebiscite on the leader. If the constitutional amendment is ratified by the voters this is held to show public confidence and trust in the President. If the President's proposed amendment fails at the polls he is expected to submit his resignation. Again the United States, as a whole, does not have an electoral process for re-affirming public confidence in a President or for removing him from office. Nonetheless some journalists and political analysts have tried to analyze Gallup and Harris polls of popular ratings of the president's performance or the fortunes of the President's own party during Congressional mid-term elections as if these were plebiscites on Presidential leadership. The problem with this approach is that even if some voters gave the President low rankings on his performance they would nonetheless support him if offered the chance to do so in a national plebiscite. Likewise many voters deliberately split their tickets, voting for the presidential candidate of X party while casting votes for Party Y's candidate for the House of Representatives (and perhaps also for Party Y's candidate for the Senate seat. Therefore how voters cast their ballots during midterm elections may have little to do with their assessment of the President's leadership or policies. Many states allow "recall elections" of their elected state executive, legislators and judges which may be viewed as Plebescitary "votes of no confidence." Similar to the initiative process the backers of a recall election must gather a minimum number of registered voters' signatures by a given deadline to have the recall election item scheduled for a special state election. There is no similar process allowing the voters of a state to recall their national representatives in the U.S. Senate or House of Representatives. Similar attempts by state legislatures or by state referenda to limit the number of terms their national representatives can serve in office have been declared to be unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court. The Single-Member-District Plurality (SMDP) system Since this is a mouthful you may also call it the "winner- take-all" system. Another figurative way of understanding this system is to call it the "first horse across the finish line" system. The Single Member District (SMD), or "winner-take-all," system is the electoral system used in the United States, Canada, and Great Britain. Under this system the nation (or state or province) is divided into electoral districts containing approximately equal numbers of voters. The United States has 435 Congressional House districts each having approximately 575,000 persons. In each district each political party will back one candidate against the candidates of rival parties. Whichever candidate secures the largest number of votes wins the seat representing that district in the national (or state or provincial) legislature. PERCENTAGE OF DISTRICT VOTE WON BY CANDIDATE OF Pretentious Milquetoasts Redneck Plutocrat Moderate Revival Party Movement Rally (PPP) (MMM) (RRR) District 1 90 8 2 District 2 51 29 20 District 3 40 21 39 District 4 19 42 39 To illustrate how this system works consider the example above which is described in what follows: The city of Laputa is divided into four districts of equal population and each district is allowed to elect one representative to sit on the four member City Council. Three different political parties have each backed its own candidate in each district and the percentages of the votes won by each party's candidate in each district were as follows: District by district, whichever candidates wins the largest chuck of votes gets the seat for that district. This "largest chunk" need not be an outright majority - most SMDP systems only require a "plurality." In District 1 the Pretentious Plutocrats have received 90% of the votes while in District 2 they received 51% of the votes. Therefore they clearly have the seats for Districts 1 and 2. In District 3 they won the largest percentage of the votes, 40%, which is a plurality giving them the seat for District 3. In District 4, however, the largest clump went to the Milquetoast Moderates. Note the effect this system has on the Redneck Revival Party: although they won at least a third of the votes in Districts 3 and 4 and at least a fifth of the votes in District 2 they received no seats at all. In effect the SMDP system tends to favor the two largest parties while making it virtually impossible for third party, or independent, candidates to win seats at all. The effect this has on most rational voters, who understand how the electoral rules promotes an implicit "two party system," is to discourage them from casting their ballots away on candidates and parties that have little chance of winning. One other matter can make it more difficult or more easy to run as an independent or third-party candidate in this system, namely the size and homogeneity of the districts. If the supporters of the Redneck Revival Rally live concentrated in certain areas of Laputa and we were to have Laputa subdivided into several more districts of smaller, yet equal numbers of voters, such an arrangement might allow the Redneck Revival Party to form the plurality, or even majority of voters in some districts in which case they might win a few seats. The larger the districts are and the more diluted the voting strength of a minor party is in that district then the less chance there will be of a third party candidate or independent winning an election. Proportional Representation System "Proportional representation" (PR) means that the numbers of seats in a legislature or electoral body are awarded to a party or to its candidates only in direct proportion to that party's or candidate's percentage of votes in the elections. Since this system is believed by some to allow a more accurate representation of the diversity of political opinions within a nation it has been adopted by several nations, such as Italy and Israel. The Democratic Party of the United States has adopted internal party rules that require proportional representation of women and members of minority groups in its party caucuses and national nominating conventions. Many nations have adopted electoral systems which incorporate aspects both of the SMD system as well as of PR. Returning to our example of the city of Laputa if we take the same election results but award seats according to Proportional Representation we achieve a different result. By summing the percentages of votes won by each party across all districts and dividing these figures by the number of districts (expressed also as a percentage figure, that is, 4 Districts equals 400 percent) you can determine what proportion of seats goes to which party. The solution is worked out below: Pretentious Milquetoasts Redneck Plutocrat Moderate Revival Party Movement Rally (PPP) (MMM) (RRR) District 1 90 8 2 District 2 51 29 20 District 3 40 21 39 District 4 19 42 39 ---- ---- ---- 200 100 100 Proportion = 200/400 100/400 100/400 of Total Votes = 50% 25% 25% As 50 percent of four seats is two seats and 25 percent of four seats is one seat the Pretentious Plutocrats receive only two seats, while the Milquetoast Moderates still receive only one. The Redneck Revival Rally wins at least one seat under this system. The PR system has some strange quirks. In the examples above the figures were rigged to work out to whole, round numbers. In reality this almost never happens. If a party won 24.5 percent of the nation-wide vote it may become an acrimonious center of contention whether that party would receive 25 seats or just 24 seats in a national legislature having 100 members. Typically PR systems impose minimum percentage cut-off figures that require a party to win at least 5 percent of the nation-wide vote before it could claim any seats at all. In cases were the percentage result creates a toss-up result between two parties there may be run-off elections held in districts were the two contending parties have won near equal pluralities. The strangest feature of the PR system, however, is the use of "party lists." Each party will list its members in descending order from their leadership status. The party leader, who would become Prime Minister if his party won a majority, would be first and the prospective members of his cabinet then numbered according to their relative pecking order within the party. Next the other parliamentary candidates of the party would be listed with incumbents ranked in order of their tenure of office or party seniority and then challengers listed in order of their seniority. In a nation-state with a 100 seat parliament Party X might run candidates in every district but if it won 60 percent of the vote then only the first 60 names on the party list would receive seats in the parliament. Occasionally this produces strange results in which a candidate with list number 58 achieved a bare plurality of 40 percent against 30 each for contenders of the two rival parties while a candidate with list number 65 had won 90 percent of the vote in his own district. In spite of the fact that candidate number 65 had contributed more to achieving the majority figure of 60 percent than did candidate number 58, candidate number 58 would probably receive a seat while candidate number 65 did not. Since independent and minor parties have a better chance of winning under this system they are more encouraged to run candidates in many districts under this system than under the SMDP system while voters who prefer the independent or the minor parties will be more encouraged to cast their votes for such candidates. However the negative side of this is that in a parliamentary system this might leave the elected body without a clear-cut majority in the hands of one party. We saw in the Politzania simulation both how factious and brittle a parliamentary system could became if it had to resort to forming a coalition government in order to rule and we also saw how the multi-party systems did not produce coalitions of the "center" able to achieve compromise and consensus. In post-World War I Germany under the Weimar Republic constitution the German Reichstag (lower House of Parliament) was unable to form stable governments because the PR system encouraged the creation of multiple parties of the left and right. Neither the Social Democrats (leading center-left party) nor the Christian Democrats (leading center- right party) could win a majority nor could either of them form a lasting coalition with the splinter parties of the far right and far left. As public disaffection with the ineffectiveness of the democratic Weimar Republic grew more people turned either to the Communist party of the far left or to the National Socialist party of the far right. In 1933 the Nazi Party had won a third of the seats in the Reichstag and, by forming a coalition with parties of the right, it eventually assumed power and abolished the democratic Weimar Constitution to create the Third Reich. Double-balloting systems As the SMDP system tends to favor the two largest parties while the PR system favors smaller parties in nation-states that already have two major parties the law-makers (who are usually members of one of those two parties) tend to favor the SMDP system. In nation-states having an existing multiple party system members of the minor parties favor the PR system as their only chance of winning national office. In post-World II Germany and post-Soviet Russia the existence of multiple parties has led to a compromise hybrid system in which voters are allowed to cast two votes: one for a political party and one for a personal candidate. Half the seats in the lower house of Parliament are reserved for distribution according to PR results and party list while the other seats are given to personal votes who win in a district according to SMDP rules. Occasionally it happens that a party might win 60% of the PR vote while personal candidates of that same party won in 65 of the 100 districts on a SMDP basis. With two votes per voter per district we would have a parliament of 100 seats, 50 reserved for PR results and the other 50 for SMDP results. The 65 candidates who won in their own districts according to SMDP rules would each receive a seat in the parliament but the other 40 seats won by the other two parties (whose personal candidates won only 35 seats) would not be reduced. Their candidates who won on the personal vote basis would get the first 35 seats then the remaining 5 would be split between them--with predictable bickering over electoral proportions. Each party would assign the extra seats according to the highest numbers remaining on their party lists. Thus the parliament would end up with 5 extra seats to accommodate the extra five "personal vote" winners of the majority party. This is done in order not to reduce the seats won on a PR basis to the other parties. This system is followed in Germany but in the Russian parliament if a similar result were reach the 5 members having the lowest party list numbers among the 65 personal vote winners would not receive seats. Single-Nontransferable vote system Some nations have used "multiple member districts" in which voters are allowed to cast only one vote for a write-in personal candidate who is being backed by one of the political parties. Originally following ratification of the 1787 Constitution many states having more than one Representative in Congress allowed candidates to run on an "at large" basis for the entire state they intended to represent. Thus if a state had three seat House seats at least three members of each party could be expected to run for those openings. If two parties were running for election each voter would have to vote for one of the six candidates. This creates a dilemma for candidates and parties: The more candidates a party allows to run for the three seats the greater the chances that some of them might be voted in. However for each of those candidates the chances of being elected is actually reduced. Worse not only is each candidate competing against candidates of the other party but he is also competing against candidates of his own party. Whichever three candidates got the three largest pluralities would fill the three seats of that state's delegation to the U.S. House of Representatives. Eventually each state with more than one representative began to divide its territory into as many Congressional Districts as they had seats in Congress in order to make elections easier for the parties, the candidates, and the voters. Japan, and a few other nations that have had this system, have switched to SMDP, PR, or double-balloting systems. Effects of Constitutional System on Elections A Parliamentary-Cabinet, unitary government ("fusion of powers") system requires a cohesive majority party or at least a cohesive ruling coalition of parties, to achieve stable and effective government. With this emphasis on party unity and party member disciple the electoral rules give the national parties greater control over their members including such devices as the "party list." A member of parliament who fails to vote consistently with his party will probably be struck off the party list. As voters realize it is political parties, rather than personalities, who control political outcomes they are unlikely to vote for independent candidates under either a PR or SMDP system. A Presidential-Congressional, separation of powers system does not require or encourage the development of strong "party governments." Even if the President is of the same party that has majorities in both houses of Congress the institutional rivalry of the White House and Capitol Hill virtually ensures that one single party-line will ever dominate the national government. Thus in elections voters tend to be more concerned with the character and record of their candidates than with their party affiliation. Parties then, rather than being in the position of "masters and disciplinarians" over their candidates, who must toe the line if they wish to be on the party list, really are on the lookout to recruit competent, charismatic figures, who can raise their own campaign expenses. Once elected these new members of Congress owe little to the party organization for their electoral fortunes and can be expected to take an independent line at odds with the rest of their party if they feel strongly on some issue that affects their constituents or is at odds with their own convictions. Election campaigns in the United States tend to be focused on personal character or charisma and record of accomplishment and less on ideological labels. Rare is the voter who consistently votes a single party ticket. Unitary states will tend to encourage the development of large national parties. Federalist systems, however, make it possible for regional parties to form, which can win political power at the state or provincial level. Unitary systems tend to concentrate voter attention on the national elections whereas federalist systems allow the possibility of multiple elections at national, state, and local levels, as well as the possibility of school bond elections, recall elections, and off-year gubernatorial elections between nation elections. The more the attentions of citizens are dispersed across local, state, and national politics the less intense is the concern with national politics with corresponding smaller turnouts in national elections than is true of unitary state system. Reapportionment: Redistricting Congressional (House) Districts By 1911 Statute the number of seats in the House of Representatives is fixed at 435 seats. Each seat should represent (approximately) equal numbers of voters. Article 1, Section 2 of the U.S. Constitution requires a census every decade so that each state will only have the numbers of House Representatives that it should have on the basis of its population. The Bureau of the Census counts the total number of persons in the United States as a whole and also the total numbers in each state, county, city, even down to the block level. If some states have gained population relative to the growth of the population of the nation as a whole then some of these states may receive extra seats in the U.S. House of Representatives. If a state has lost population relative to the rest of the nation (that is, it either has actually decreased in population or less has simply not grown at the same rate as the rest of the nation) that it may lose a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. Since the total number of seats is limited to 435 that means if some states gain seat then other states must lose seats so that the total number of seats remains the same. Since the southern and western states have been growing in population at a much greater rate than the northeastern and upper Midwest states that means that political power has increasingly shifted from the traditional centers of power around New York City, Boston, Philadelphia and Chicago to southern states and cities such as Atlanta, Miami, Los Angeles, and Houston. However if a state does not gain or lose population relative to the rest of the nation (in other words, if its population grew at the same rate as the rest of the nation) the populations of the Congressional districts, counties and cities within the state might grow or decline with respect to each other. Therefore the lines of the Congressional Districts might still need to be redrawn to keep the numbers of persons being represented in each district the same. To make this more concrete assume that a certain State X with three members in the U.S. House of Representatives was found to have a population of 2,300,000 following the conclusion of the last U.S. Census in 1992. The same Census found the population of the entire United States to be approximately 250 million. That would mean that each district should have the following numbers of people being represented by each member of the U.S. House of Representatives. 250,000,000/435 = 574,713 or approximately 575,000 people per seat If we then divide the population of State X by this figure we would get the number of seats that the State was entitled to in the U.S. House of Representatives: 2,300,000/575,000 = 4 seats Once the U.S. Bureau of the Census published its 1992 findings it would be up to the State Legislature of State X to redistrict the State into four Congressional districts. The main legal limitations on the Legislature is that it must seek to create districts of approximately equal population and that each district should be contained within one set of boundaries (i.e. one district should not form several "islands" in the midst of other districts. This is where the Census data on counties and cities is useful in helping the Legislature in its task of redrawing lines in order to create new districts of near equal populations. The existing statutory and case law does not prohibit the Legislature from redrawing the districts in order to favor those interests that dominate the legislature or else from benefitting the political party in control of the Legislature. In many states in which agriculture had been the main livelihood the State legislatures were dominated by farmers who wanted the redistricting always to favor agricultural areas over urban areas, even when the metropolitan areas around an urban center would have enough population to form a separate congressional district. Let's now return to the Legislature of State X and see what it does in trying to create four new districts: State X Before Redistricting State X After Redistricting |---------------/--------| |------------|------------| | A A /A A | |A A | A A | | / | | | | | A A U/ U A A| | A A U| U A A | | |---- | | |---|--------| | U/ U* U | | U /U*/U | | / | |-----------/ / | | A A/U U A A | | A A U /U A A | | | --| | | | | A A| A A | | A A | A A | |---------|--------------| |-------------|-----------| Each U = 100,000 "Upstarts," people living in the main urban area Each A = 100,000 "Aggies," people living in an agricultural area U* = State Capital, the "City of Upstart" Although the State Capital of X has a metropolitan population of around 700,000 the members of the State Legislature largely represent the 1,600,000 people of State X who are farmers. Since these constituents are anxious that the redistricting not prejudice their interests note that the Redistricting has concentrated the numbers of farmers in each district so that they form a majority whereas the State Capital, which could easily form a entire new district, has been subdivided in such a way that the city-dwellers form only a minority in each of the new districts. This is what has been done in Idaho: Ada County, in which Boise with its 250,000 citizens is located, have been "split" between Idaho's First and Second Congressional Districts so that the urban interests of Boise will not overshadow the agricultural interests in either district. This approach to redistricting is summarized as "Pack 'em and Crack 'em" that is, pack as many people of your own interest or party into each district so that they form a majority there and crack, or subdivide, concentrations of a different interest group or political party so that they will not form a majority anywhere. This approach to redistricting is also referred to as "gerry- mandering." Homework Assignment to be Discussed in Class: The following exercise requires some mathematical computations and it may be helpful to use a calculator. If you are uncertain of your math skills you are permitted to collaborate with other students in doing this exercise or to seek the help of other students in doing these computations. 1. PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION VERSUS "WINNER-TAKE-ALL" ELECTIONS The State of Massachusetts currently has ten representatives in the U.S. House of Representatives. The State is accordingly divided into ten congressional districts in each of which the Republican, the Democrat, and the Libertarian parties run candi- dates. The election returns (as percentages of eligible votes cast) are as follows: District % Republican % Democrat % Libertarian 01 90 9 1 02 51 35 14 03 30 40 30 04 34 45 21 05 45 25 30 06 90 9 1 07 51 37 12 08 30 40 30 09 34 35 31 10 45 25 30 a. If Massachusetts's electoral laws awarded seats to each party on the basis of proportional representation, about how many seats would each party receive in the House of Representatives? (HINT: add percentages in columns and divide by 1000%) b. If the ten seats are awarded to individual winners on the basis of "winner-take-all" single-member districts, how many seats would go to each party? c. If you were a voter in Massachusetts, which actually uses the single-member district "winner-take-all" system, what parties would you regard as the "real" contenders for seats in the House? II. PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION IN U.S. CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICTS The 1990 Civil Rights Act mandated the creation of "majority- minority" districts to ensure that African Americans and Hispanics would be given better chances to elect House Representatives of their own respective racial or ethnic derivation. Several states, including Louisiana, Texas, and North Carolina, proceeded to redraw districts in order to create districts having African American majorities. The most enthusiastic supporters of this bill have been interest groups representing racial minorities, such as the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, and also liberal Democrats who support Affirmative Action. Those Democrats have assumed that supporting "majority-minority" districts would strengthen the Democratic Party, which many African Americans and Hispanics have generally supported. Assume the State of Iowa has the following distribution of non-Hispanic residents (each N=100,000 non-Hispanic residents/citizens) and of Hispanic residents (each H = 100,000 Hispanic residents/citizens). Iowa's Current Districts Draw in New Districts Here: /------|------------------ /------------------------- | N| N N | | N N N | | N N | | | N N | | | N N | | N N | | N H |-----| |--------| | N H | |------| H | H | H N N | | H H H N N | | N N H| | | N | | N N H N | | N N| |------| N | | N N N | | | N N N N | | | N N N N | ------|------------|-----/ -------------------------/ Assume each Congressional District should have 500,000 resi- dents/citizens. Assume 55 percent of the non-Hispanic citizens always vote "Republican" while the other 45 percent always vote "Democratic." Assume 80 percent of the Hispanic citizens always vote "Democratic" while the remaining 20 percent always votes "Republican." 1. Given the overall distribution of Republican and Democratic voters, which party is most likely to dominate the Iowa State Legislature? [Assume Hispanics and non-Hispanics are evenly distributed through the many state legislative districts not shown in the above map.] 2. Given the districts that exist as shown above and the (hypothetical) distribution of non-Hispanic and Hispanic citizens shown above determine how many of Iowa's five members of the House of Representatives will be members of the Democratic Party and how many would be members of the Republican Party. 3. Redistrict Iowa to create a "majority-minority" district so that Iowa's Hispanics can always be assured of having enough of a majority to be enabled to vote a Hispanic candidate into the House of Representatives if they so choose. Now determine how many of Iowa's House Representatives will be Democrats or Republicans. 4. In light of this exercise what effect would extensive and thorough redistricting of states to create more "majority- minority" districts have on the future fortunes of the two major political parties in our nation? DON'T WAFFLE! TELL ME WHICH PARTY COMES OUT AHEAD AND WHICH ONE LOSES!!!