45. ELECTION OF PRESIDENT BY A DIRECT VOTE BY STATES.

In the Continental Congress and its successor, the Congress of the Confederation, all officers had been chosen by a vote by States. A similar principle was recognized in the Constitution, which provided in the electoral system that each State should have two votes, corresponding to the number of Senators, besides one for each Representative in Congress; and in case of no choice by the electors, the election should devolve upon the House of Representatives, the vote being taken by States, "the representation from each State having one vote." Thirty-five propositions retaining this federative principle of the Constitution proposed that the President and Vice-President should be elected by a direct vote of the qualified voters, given by States. While doing away with the electoral colleges, the electoral ratio or votes of the States were to be retained. Such propositions were brought forward at two different periods, the first between the years 1826 and 1848, the second since 1875. In their general characteristics they fall naturally into two groups, corresponding very nearly to the periods just mentioned; the one providing that the persons receiving the greatest number of votes in a State should be declared to have received the entire vote of the State; the other that the Presidential vote of each State should be divided among the candidates in proportion to the popular vote received by them in the State.

The earliest of the resolutions of the first group was presented by Mr. Haynes of Georgia, in 1826.3 Eleven similar resolutions were proposed at different times within the next twenty years, the greater number, indeed, within the next ten.1 Three of these resolutions, from the general assembly of Georgia and the legislatures of Alabama and Missouri, are interesting as showing with what jealous care the sovereignty and equality of the State was guarded. The general assembly of Georgia declared their concurrence with the legislature of Missouri in the proposal to amend the Constitution so as to

Constitution, art. 2, sec. 1, cls. 2 and 3, as originally adopted, retained in article XII of the amendments.

2 A number of votes equal to the number of Senators and Representatives to which the State was entitled in Congress.

3 App., No. 559.

4 App., Nos. 560, 583, 594, 600, 609, 641, 661, 663, 683, 735, 741.

App., Nos. 583, 600.

Ante, par. 42, App., No. 601a.

provide a uniform mode of electing President and Vice-President by the direct vote of the people, "provided such alterations can be so made that the sovereignty of the States be not invaded and the weight of the States and the present basis of representation be retained according to existing conditions of the Constitution." 1 The Alabama and Missouri resolutions were very similar.2

The only essential difference between the amendments of this group was the provision for the method to be employed for the choice of President in case no one received a majority of the vote of all the States.3

This amendment, so frequently urged at this time, was not again presented until 1878, when it was revived by Mr. Sampson of Iowa.4 The same proposition has been introduced once since, in 1886.5

The amendments of the second group, providing for the division of the electoral or Presidential vote of the State, were for the most part introduced since 1875. They were preceded by two isolated propositions which foreshadowed the terms of the amendment of the later period. The first of these was presented by Mr. Lawrence of New York, in 1848," His plan proposed that the number of votes given to each person shall be estimated as such a proportion of the vote of the State as the said vote shall bear to the whole number of votes given within the State for President. "Any person receiving a majority of all the votes so estimated, given in all the States for President, shall be President." By this method it is seen. that the relative weight of each State is retained, and yet provision is made that the minority vote given in each State shall be counted. To Mr. Lawrence should be given the credit of having been the first to suggest in Congress a system of proportional voting.

Similar resolutions were introduced in the legislature of Maryland, Niles' Register, XXXVII, 428. The legislature of Vermont nonconcurred with the Georgia resolution, Am. An. Reg., VI, 322. The Georgia resolutions further declared it desirable to amend so that in no case shall the election devolve upon the House of Representatives if provision is made for securing to the States an equal vote in such decisions in the last resort. App., No. 600

* App., Nos. 583, 594a. The legislatures of Connecticut and Vermont disapproved of the Missouri amendment. Massachusetts Archives, Nos. 9919, 9019.

3 Post, par. 50, especially Mr. McComas s amendment, No. 661.

4 App., No. 1467, in case of a tie in a State the vote to be equally divided.

App., No. 1672.

6 App., No. 754.

Which was to be equal to the number of Senators and Representatives of said State in Congress.

Over twenty years later Mr. Ashley of Ohio, who was very zealous in his attempts to secure a new method of electing the President,' renewed the suggestion of a proportional division of the vote of each State among the different parties, but, curiously enough, his plan retained the colleges of electors. With the renewal of the discussion of the desirability of changing the method of electing the President in 1874-75, the first of twenty resolutions suggesting anew the adoption of a system of a proportional division of the electoral vote of a State among the various candidates was presented.3 It was introduced by Mr. Smith of New York as substitute for the amendment reported by the House Committee on Elections, which proposed the district system. Mr. Smith's substitute was designed to meet the objection urged against a popular vote regardless of State lines, for it still proposed to leave to the States their weight of influence by an ingenious but compli cated system of computing the votes. This plan, Mr. Smith

said in proposing it, he framed "for the purpose of obviating the danger and difficulty of a large accumulation of contestedelection cases in the electoral districts proposed by the plan of the Committee on Elections, and to prevent the gerrymandering of States by partisan majorities in the construction of election districts, and to dispense with the cumbersome machinery of electoral districts, while preserving the autonomy of the States in the election of President and Vice-President." The next resolutions were suggested by the contested election of 1876. They were presented by Messrs. Maish, Springer,

For other methods proposed by him, see ante, par. 42. From the variety of propositions he introduced he was known as "the suggesting member."

The voters were to vote by ballot for President and Vice-President. Then the legia. lature of each State was to divide the total number of votes cast by the number of Senators and Representatives to which such State was entitled in Congress, and the product shall be the ratio of one elector. The legislature was then to appoint the electors, "taking care to secure to each candidate voted for in the State an equitable representation in the electoral college, as indicated by the number of votes returned for each candidate. The electors thus appointed were to vote for one of the candidates named for President and Vice-President, respectively, by the voters at the general election. App. No. 1283f. 3 App., Nos. 1386, 1437, 1438, 1439, 1441, 1475, 1493, 1503, 1508, 1537, 1538, 1542, 1569, 1589, 1624, 1639, 1640, 1697, 1705, 1735. It was generally supposed to be an entirely new plan. 4 Ante, par. 44. App., No. 1386.

It required that the aggregate vote for President in each State shall be divided by the number of Representatives apportioned to such State in the House of Representatives and twice the result or quotient shall be added to the vote of the candidate having the highest number of the popular vote in such State for President as, and for the State vote for, such candidate. The person having the highest number of votes in all the States, including the popular vote and the State vote, shall be President.

6 Cong. Record, Forty-third Congress, second session, pp. 748-749.

and Cravens, in 1877, and were based on the same general principle as the preceding proposition, but differed as to the method employed in computing the vote. Mr. Maish's plan provided that the electoral vote of each State should be distributed among the candidates in the proportion the electoral ratio. shall bear to the popular vote of each candidate. The electoral ratio was the quotient obtained by dividing the whole number of votes returned by the whole number of the State's electoral vote. Mr. Maish's resolution has been introduced four times since, twice by himself and twice by Mr. Beltzhoover, also from Pennsylvania.2

Mr. Springer's resolution proposed a like distribution among the candidates of the electoral vote of the State, the candidate having the largest fraction should have the odd Presidential votes, if any remain, each State should be entitled to as many votes as it had Senators and Representatives in Congress, except that States having but one member of the House of Representatives should be entitled to but two votes, and States having but two members of the House of Representatives should be entitled to but three votes in the election of President and Vice-President. Mr. Springer has introduced a resolution proposing this amendment in every Congress since 1882, the text of the proposed amendment being similar to the one first submitted by him, save the provision for reducing the number of electoral votes of the small States does not appear.1

Mr. Cravens's device for ascertaining the Presidential vote to which each person voted for in any State was entitled, was to multiply the whole number of votes of the qualified electors in the State for such person by the number of Presidential votes to which the State was entitled and divide the sum so obtained by the aggregate votes of the qualified electors of the State for all persons for President, using for that purpose not exceeding three decimal fractions.5 Resolutions proposing a similar method of computing the votes have been introduced eight times since. Two of these were reported favorably by the

App., No. 1437.

2 App., Nos. 1438, 1503, 1542, 1705; also introduced in the Fifty-first Congress by Mr. Maish.

3 App., No. 1439.

4 App., Nos. 1569, 1624, 1640, 1735.

No. 1569 contains this provision; the others do not.

5 The fractional part of a Presidential vote remaining shall be added to the Presidential vote of the person receiving the highest number of votes in the State. App., No. 1441. App., Nos. 1475, 1493, 1508, 1537, 1538,-1589, 1639, 1697. All applied the foregoing provi sions to the election of Vice-President.

H. Doc. 353, pt 2——7

Select Committee of the House of Representatives on the Election of President and Vice-President in 1878, and again in 1880. Since 1881 Mr. Browne of Indiana has proposed this amendment in each Congress. All of these amendments were presented in the House, but none were ever brought to a vote. Some provided that the person having the highest number of votes should be President; others that if no person had a majority the joint convention of the Senate and House should choose the President from the two highest on the list.3

Doubtless there is too much mathematics in some of these plans to make them popular, but the simpler method of computing the vote proposed by Messrs. Maish and Springer might easily be understood. Some such application of the system of proportional representation to the election of President and Vice-President seems not only practicable, but peculiarly just and equitable, inasmuch as it not only preserves the weight of each State, but also gives a proportional part of the electoral vote to the minority candidate in each State."

46. ELECTION FROM CANDIDATES DESIGNATED BY THE STATES.

Previous to the campaign preparatory to the Presidential election of 1832, the candidates for President had been nominated either by a caucus composed of the members of one party in Congress, or by the legislatures of the States, or even by certain counties in a State. Such nominations were far from carrying the weight possessed by the modern conventionthe voice of a powerful party organization.

The practice of nominating by party convention was first inaugurated in the campaign for the election of President in 1832. In 1830 the first political national convention of delegates representing the people was held by the Anti-Masonic party. The following year the same party inaugurated the practice of holding a national nominating convention, which

App., Nos. 1475, 1508. Able and interesting reports: 1878, H. Rep., Forty-fifth Congress, second session, Vol. IV, No. 819. It contains a table applying the proposed system to the vote given in 1876 for President. The minority report appealed to the spirit of State rights to defeat the measure, fearing interference by the Federal Government in the States on the ground of intimidation. 1880, H. Rep., Forty-sixth Congress, second session, Vol. II, No. 347.

2 As App., Nos. 1475, 1493, 1508. These made provisions for a tie to be settled as at present.

3 As App., Nos. 1441, 1538.

4 The method proposed by the Cravens plan is doubtless the most accurate, but correspondingly complicated.

5 For further discussion of proportional plin, see post, par. 51, and note.

6 Stanwood, p. 104-109.