There is such a thing as a citizen`s being so innocent and well-intentioned and zealous for the public good that he represents a continuous threat.
David Pryor, the junior senator from Arkansas and the most popular politician in the state, was at it again the other day, when he appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee in his determined effort to undermine one of the most useful and least understood sources of stability and continuity in the Republic, the Electoral College.
The quadrennial impulse to ”reform” the way Americans elect a president now has abated along with Ross Perot`s candidacy, but Sen. Pryor is such a sincere, dedicated type that he is not about to abandon a bad cause.
Never mind that the country`s electoral system had just proven its worth once again by narrowing the presidential field to a convenient two, thus discouraging the kind of dizzying side effects that electing the president by popular vote might bring on: messy run-offs, new incentives for vote fraud, splinter parties, and general confusion.
Just envision the outcome of a presidential election hinging on a few thousand late votes from South Texas or Cook County, Ill., that would determine which two out of 23 candidates would make it into the run-off. That`s only one of the entertaining scenarios possible under the Pryor Plan, which includes a run-off provision should no one candidate poll 40 percent of the popular vote first time out. Give the senator his way and an American presidential election could yet attain all the dignity and charm of a preferential primary in the old one-party South.
But no need to go into such harrowing details, not when the witness before the Senate committee is testifying against the Electoral College rather than in favor of any proven alternative. Pryor is greatly concerned about the ”inherent problems” of the current system, which has operated without a hitch for a century and with only a few for the century before that. Yet he appears oblivious to the problems that an untried system would pose. This may be the nature of attractive and innocent reformers, who tend to prefer abstract theories to a close examination of how their glossy theories might turn out in reality, which can be a real spoilsport.
In abstract terms, the Electoral College shouldn`t work at all. The product of an 18th Century mentality, it has been shaped by historical circumstances its designers could scarcely have foreseen. (The same criticisms could be made of the United States of America.)
The continuous success of the Electoral College offends logic. It shouldn`t be working so satisfactorily, any more than a bumblebee should be able to fly. David Pryor notes that the College isn`t democratic. ”The basic constitutional principle of one man, one vote,” he argues, ”applies to every election for political office in the United States from county clerk to United States senator.” So why shouldn`t it apply to the election of a president?
Good argument. But only in theory. For there is another American institution besides the Electoral College that is not based on the principle of one-man, one vote. And surely David Pryor would not abolish it. That exclusive institution is one to which Pryor himself belongs: the United States Senate.
In the Senate, seats are apportioned according to states, not population. A state like Arkansas with only a couple of million people gets two senators, the same number allotted California with its 30 million people. If the principle of one man, one vote really applied to all American elections, the United States would be divided into senatorial districts of roughly equal population, and David Pryor could run in a district carved out of parts of Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi. That would be completely logical; it just wouldn`t make much sense.
Surely the junior senator from Arkansas would be the first to object to any such ”reform.” Surely he would argue that institutions which history has molded should not be lightly changed, particularly if they reflect a community of interest and also contribute to the stability and continuity of the Republic. He would be right.
The Electoral College, like the Senate, reflects the influence of individual states-also regions, communities, and interests. It is a product of history, and rests on more than the latest census. It is a product of more than one single, arbitrary, abstract principle like one-man, one-vote. The Electoral College is part of a complex series of checks and balances, and it cannot be altered without changing the rest of the political mechanism in ways that may not be foreseeable or desirable.
The Electoral College allows the popular will not just to be expressed but to be channeled, so that the great quadrennial American choice is not simply a confused outpouring of contradictory sentiments but an intelligible popular mandate-and one that is delivered quickly and definitely. It is a marvel.
How the Electoral College works is not easy to explain. That it works is undeniable.
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If only the Electoral College were brand new and untried, if only it operated on one simple and even simplistic principle, and if only its effectiveness could be explained in a few words, or with some short slogan that could substitute for thought — One Man, One Vote!-then David Pryor might support it. But it wouldn`t work nearly so well.