2008 Electoral college: Cheney will open the envelopes and count the votes!

[pnwmom]

Would you trust Mr. Secrecy with this job? Unfortunately, the Constitution does.

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20070709/huq

SNIP

Discussed only in the convention's closing days, the Office of the Vice President was initially dreamt up to solve a problem with presidential selection. Under the original Electoral College system, each elector had two votes and was constitutionally obliged to cast one of those for an out-of-state candidate. The Framers reckoned this was a way of counteracting the provincial inclination to vote for a home boy, a worry borne out in the 1796 election, which left Thomas Jefferson as Vice President despite a Federalist majority. But the Framers were puzzled as to how to stop electors from simply throwing away that second vote. Enter the Vice President. This secondary office solved the wasted vote problem. And rather neatly, it solved at the same time the presidential succession problem.

Concerned that the vice presidency could be a staging post for a coup, the Framers cast about for some other function for the office. Drawing on the 1777 New York Constitution's design of a Lieutenant Governor's office, they hit on a solution--the Vice President would also serve as a tie-breaking president pro tempore of the Senate. This, they concluded, would justify his salary. Wearing his Senate cap, the Vice President would also conduct the presidential electoral vote count.

All these neat fixes unraveled quickly with the 1800 election. This ended in the sitting Vice President, Thomas Jefferson, presiding over a deadlocked Electoral College with substantial voting irregularities--and then counting himself into the presidency. As Yale law professor Bruce Ackerman and co-author David Fontana tell the tale, Jefferson brazenly took it upon himself to adjudicate a "blatant" irregularity with Georgia's votes. With a potential independent run by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg raising the possibility of all kinds of Electoral College deal-making in 2008, the prospect of Cheney at the lectern tallying ballots should cause some trepidation.

SNIP

There is no call for another amendment. Yet. But perhaps we do need to start thinking about why perhaps the most powerful office in the country is not on the top of a ballot, and why its powers are not defined--or circumscribed--by any law or constitutional provision. Perhaps Congress could take for starters the order on classified evidence that Cheney is disobeying. It's an executive order because Congress passed the buck on crafting a legislative system for handling classified evidence. It's long past time for Congress to take this on. Past legislation has further provided clear channels of responsibility, particularly on military matters. That, indeed, was the primary purpose of the 1947 National Security Act, which implemented important reforms to the Armed Services.

It would be a good debate to have before the 2008 election, when Cheney will start opening the envelopes.

[annabanana]

1. Well now THAT'S a bit disconcerting!

We really have to get him out of there beforehand. (YooHoo!. . Nancy?)

[pnwmom]

3. The other option might be to pass a law limiting his options.

No V.P. should be able to do what Jefferson did.

[loyalkydem]

2. One word

impeech

[pnwmom]

4. But why would you trust ANY of them with that job,

given the precedents they have already set for executive preogative and secrecy?

We need to change the law that gives a V.P. free rein in this regard.

[deadmessengers]

5. Fathless electors

You'd need a whole lot of "faithless electors" for that to mean anything. Every few Presidential cycles, we hear about one, but normally, the Electoral College is comprised of party stalwarts who vote the way they were pledged. We've got a crapload to hang on Cheney, but this isn't one of those things.

[pnwmom]

6. Suppose Cheney announces the vote and it doesn't comport with

expectations. Then he claims his secrecy privileges.

Then what?

[deadmessengers]

7. Then you have 100 senators who can challenge it. n/t

[pnwmom]

8. And then, no matter how many challenge it, it goes to the Supreme Court.

Which you apparently have a lot of confidence in.