The confused and protracted conclusion of the presidentialelection is stimulating broad debate in Congress about major reformsto the election laws, with lawmakers dusting off proposals to abolishthe electoral college and producing a range of new plans to overhaulthe way in which Americans vote for their president.
Virtually every major election dispute over the years has led tocalls for change, but the shock effect of the recount controversy inFlorida--and the unprecedented delay in determining whether Al Goreor George W. Bush will be the next president--is prompting moreproposals than usual and a growing sense that Congress may actuallydo something.
"Based on what we're going through now, Congress has an absoluteobligation to give a long and hard look at the whole electoralprocess," said Rep. Jim Leach (R-Iowa). "To have the world's greatestdemocracy facing the possibility of a legitimacy challenge as we gointo the 21st century is simply bizarre."
Proposals range from constitutional amendments to scrap theelectoral college in favor of the popular election of the president--an idea that was first offered in Congress in 1797--to a wide arrayof more modest changes that include weekend voting, casting ballotsvia the Internet and increased uniformity in standards for therecounting of votes.
Significantly, despite the intense partisanship of thepresidential fight, many of the proposals are being offered jointlyby Republicans and Democrats. Most are being put forward to invitediscussion within a top-to-bottom review of voting procedures, eitherby a bipartisan panel or by the Federal Election Commission.
Two committee chairmen said yesterday that they will holdhearings. Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who heads the Senate RulesCommittee, announced that the panel will hear testimony on suchmatters as poll closing times, ballot formats, voting equipment,absentee voting and the "timeliness and accuracy of vote counting."
At a separate news conference, Rep. W.J. "Billy" Tauzin (R-La.),who chairs a House Commerce subcommittee, reaffirmed his plans tosummon television news executives and pollsters to testify on thenetworks' mistaken projections on election night.
The most fundamental change under discussion--and the one facingthe most obstacles--is the elimination or alteration of the electoralcollege.
The idea of abolishing or changing the electoral college has beenaround virtually since it was created. The Congressional ResearchService has counted 1,028 proposals for changing the system, datingback to the 1st Congress, according to an aide to Leach. That totalaccounts for almost one out of every 10 constitutional amendmentsever proposed in Congress.
Twice since World War II--in 1950 and 1969--plans for majorrevisions to the electoral college won approval in one chamber ofCongress but died in the other. But the idea picked up some prominentbackers after Election Day, which ended with Gore leading the popularvote tally but facing the prospect of losing the electoral collegevote to Bush.
Among the supporters are House Minority Leader Richard A. Gephardt(D-Mo.), Sen.-elect Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) and several otherlawmakers, including a bipartisan team from Illinois--Sen. Richard J.Durbin (D) and Rep. Ray LaHood (R), who had jointly sponsored anamendment to scrap the electoral college even before the Nov. 7election.
Durbin concedes that an amendment--which would require theapproval of two-thirds majorities in both houses of Congress and aratification by three-fourths of the states--would face exceedinglyhigh hurdles. He said a major problem is the influence that smallstates, which have disproportionate clout in the electoral collegeand are thus reluctant to get rid of it, have in both the Senate andthe state-by-state ratification process.
But LaHood argues that many major constitutional amendmentsstarted out with the odds stacked against them but were ultimatelyapproved because of their proponents' persistence and strongleadership. "I don't buy the argument that it can't be done," hesaid.
Some on both sides of the argument are interested in exploring asystem under which the winner in each congressional district wouldget one elector, with the overall winner of the state getting itsother two electors. States are free to adopt this arrangement now.Nebraska and Maine have such a proportional representation system,which supporters say more accurately reflects the popular vote.
The greatest range of proposals involve improving the votingsystem. Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) noted that Iowa has seven differentkinds of voting devices, ranging from hand ballots to fullyelectronic machines. But when he turned up to vote in his hometown ofCumming on Election Day, he said, he was greeted by a machine he hadnever encountered before.
"There were blinking lights, push buttons, a roll-up page, thenmore blinking lights . . . and more roll-ups," he recalled. Hisdaughter, Amy, who had gone to the polling place with him, finallywent to an election official for instructions.
"I was too embarrassed to ask," Harkin recalled.
Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) released this week a plan aimedat modernizing ballot systems by offering states and localgovernments federal matching grants to help them pay for improvementsthat would meet federally approved standards. "We're moving into the21st century and we have an antediluvian election system in most ofthe country," Schumer said.
The idea of creating an independent commission that would studyways to ensure a speedier and more accurate reporting of electionresults is receiving bipartisan backing in both the Senate and theHouse.
Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) has proposed the creation of a panelthat would look mainly at technological improvements, such as fullyelectronic voting machines. As Specter sees it, Congress would thenrequire any changes through federal legislation, while leaving theconduct of elections to local officials, which is the case today.Others are more inclined toward providing federal incentives to localcommunities.
"The federal government preempts states where there is a dominantfederal interest, and I have no doubt that in this case there is adominant federal interest," Specter said.
In the House, Leach and a Democratic colleague, Rep. Peter A.DeFazio (Ore.), have proposed a similar but broader study that wouldlook into the "historical rationale" of the electoral college, aswell as into voter registration rules, mail-in and absenteeballoting, new technologies, polling locations and closing times,ballot design and weekend or multiple-day voting.
"If Boeing built airplanes like we conduct elections, no one wouldever get on an airplane again," DeFazio said.
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