A plan to rig the Electoral College

Who Needs to Win to Win? Can a party rule by capturing most of the country but less than half of the people? We might be about to find out.

By Jonathan Chait, New York Magazine
Published Feb 3, 2013

In the immediate aftermath of last November’s election, the Republican Party, snapped suddenly out of the self-delusion of imminent victory promulgated by the Karl Roves and Dick Morrises of their party, came face-to-face with grim reality: Most of America hated them. And the Americans who didn’t hate them were dying off at a disconcerting pace. Something, nearly everybody both inside and outside the party agreed, would have to be done to rehabilitate the party brand. These were the choices: change, or continue to lose.

Since the New Year, though, a third possibility has emerged. What if Republicans don’t compromise with public opinion, but also don’t lose?

A glimpse of such a future came slowly into view in the weeks following the election, when Republican legislators in Virginia, Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Ohio floated, with varying levels of commitment, a plan to rig the Electoral College. Each of those states voted for Obama, yet Republicans controlled each of their state governments. The plan would entail allocating the electoral vote in each state not in a lump sum to the candidate who gets more votes, but piecemeal, to the winner of each congressional district.

(More here.)