Electoral Commission

“ The fact, however, that the Senate in 1876 was controlled by the Republicans and the House by the Democrats, lessened the chances of any harmonious settlement of these questions by Congress. The country seemed on the verge of civil war. Hence it was that by an act of the 29th of January 1877, Congress created the Electoral Commission to pass upon the contested returns, giving it “the same powers, if any” possessed by itself in the premises, the decisions to stand unless rejected by the two houses separately. ”

“ There is nothing in positive law, or in the reason of things, which, if the fact certified do not exist, requires that its falsity should not be open to proof.
The Electoral Commission and the Senate read the Constitution as if the words following in italics were part of it:
"Each State shall appoint, in such manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a number of electors equal to the whole number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress ”

“ The detailed organisation, powers and duties of the Civil Service Administration shall be determined by law. Article 58 – Electoral Commission
There shall be established an Electoral Commission, operating independently, without interference, which shall, on the basis of the electoral law, ensure that free and fair elections are held and administer their implementation; decide on issues raised in the course of the electoral process; and formulate and implement civic educational programmes relating to elections and other democratic procedures. ”

“ No member of a State Legislature can refuse to proceed, at the proper time, to elect Senators to Congress, or to provide for the choice of electors of President and Vice-President, any more than the members can refuse, when the appointed day arrives, to meet the members of the other House, to count the votes for those officers and ascertain who are chosen."102 This was before the invention in 1877 of an electoral commission to relieve Congress of its constitutional duty to count the vote. ”

“ They exercise supervisory power over every branch of public administration and over the electors. The methods they choose to employ in coming to a decision are such as the two houses, acting separately or together, may lawfully employ. Sir, the grant of power to the commission is in just that measure, no more and no less. The decision they render can be overruled by the concurrent votes of the two houses. Is it not competent for the two houses of Congress to agree that a concurrent majority of the two houses is necessary to reject the electoral vote of a State? ”

“ Had any other man been the Democratic candidate, he would have been a great leader and an aggressive one; but from the beginning to the close of the post-election battle Tilden was apparently dwarfed into utter helplessness, and when it became evident that the Commission would decide against him, he distinctly disclaimed all responsibility for the creation of the tribunal. The Electoral Commission was finally made up under the law, composed of Senators Edmunds, Morton, Frelinghuysen, Republicans, and Thurman and Bayard, Democrats ”

“ Whereas, in accordance with the requirements of the time, certain articles of the Regulations for the election of Members to the National Consultative Assembly were seen to need alteration, agreeably to the Command, irresistible as Fate, of His Most Sacred Royal and Imperial Majesty (may God immortalize his dominion and rule) a Commission was formed of well-wishers to the Nation in co-operation with members of the [former] National Assembly, comprising twenty members and deciding by a majority of votes, to construct a new Electoral Law. ”

“ Is no allowance to be made for the fluidity of progressive democracy? Is it imagined that active political thought can be compelled to follow stereotyped channels? Too profound a respect for a system designed to meet former conditions led the Royal Commission on Electoral Methods to the conclusion that, "reviewing the whole of the evidence, and duly considering the gravity of the change involved, we are unable to report that a case has been made out before us for the adoption of the transferable vote here and now for elections to the House of Commons." ”

“ As stated in paragraph 51, the Higher Commission of Elections verifies the eligibility of candidates seeking election to the Legislative Assembly. The Higher Commission of Elections is the sole body competent to receive allegations of electoral fraud, voter intimidation or illegal interference with the process of an election. ”

“ The draft amendments to the Elections and Political Parties Act are being discussed in the Electoral Affairs Committee of the Congress of the Republic. The basis for this discussion is the preliminary draft submitted by the Supreme Electoral Tribunal, which reflects the consensus reached within the Electoral Reform Commission. The Congressional Committee has launched a broad debate on the amendments and is receiving proposals on this issue from women’s organizations, civic committees and the Chamber of Communications and Radio Broadcasting of Guatemala. ”

“ Counting the votes of the electors, a function that the 12th Amendment assigns to Congress, is an administrative and largely ceremonial act. Our job is simply to count the votes certified by each State—nothing more. We should not attempt to usurp the roles of the voters, the States, or the electoral college. ”

“ Then, on a date set by the ECA, each state’s ascertained electors were required to meet and collect the results of the presidential election—that is, to cast electoral votes based on their state’s popular vote, and to send their electoral votes, along with the state executive’s certification that they were the state’s legitimate electors, to the United States Congress to be counted and certified in an official proceeding. ”

“ In a per curiam opinion—meaning all nine Justices, that it was unanimous—they noted strict adherence to the provisions of the Electoral Count Act may create “a ‘safe harbor’ for a State insofar as congressional consideration of its electoral votes is concerned.” ”

“ Through state laws, each of the fifty states and the District of Columbia chose to select their electors based on the popular vote in the state. After election day, the ECA required each state to formally determine—or “ascertain”—the electors who would represent the state’s voters by casting electoral votes on behalf of the candidate who had won the popular vote, and required the executive of each state to certify to the federal government the identities of those electors. ”

“ Nor does it present the question, inherent in the bicameral form of our Federal Government, whether a State may have one house chosen without regard to population. The District Court, however, analogized Georgia's use of the county unit system in determining the results of a statewide election to phases of our federal system. It pointed out that under the electoral college, [8] required by Art. II, § 1, of the Constitution and the Twelfth Amendment in the election of the President, voting strength 'is not in exact proportion to population * * *. ”

“ These particulars were, therefore, placed under the direction of Congress, with the single restriction, that the day of voting in the electoral colleges should be the same throughout the United States. In order to make the electors a distinct and independent body of persons, appointed for the sole function of choosing the President and Vice-President, it was provided further, that no senator or representative, or person holding an office of trust or profit under the United States, shall be appointed an elector. ”

“ This device of prepledged and oath-bound electors imposes upon the party within the State an oath-bound regularity and loyalty to the controlling element in the national party. It centralizes party control and, instead of securing for the locality a share in the central management, it secures the central management in dominance of the local vote in the Electoral College. If we desire free elections, we should not add to the leverage over local party representatives always possessed by those who enjoy the prestige and dispense the patronage of a national administration. ”

“ As such, it is my constitutional duty to promote honest and accurate elections by rejecting electoral college vote submissions from States whose electoral systems are so badly flawed as to render their vote submissions unreliable, untrustworthy, and unworthy of acceptance. ”

“ Article II created the electoral college, providing that the States would select electors in the manner provided by State legislatures, and those electors would in turn vote for the President. Today, every State selects Presidential electors by popular vote, and each State’s laws provide for procedures to resolve election disputes, including through lawsuits if necessary. After any election issues are resolved in State or Federal court, each State’s government transmits a certificate of the ascertainment of the appointed electors to Congress and the National Archives. ”

“ Quite naturally, for the work of electing a candidate presupposes a state of mind very different from that of serene deliberation. In 1800 the electors acted simply as automata recording the victory of their party, and so it has been ever since. In our own time presidents and vice-presidents are nominated, not without elaborate intrigue, by special conventions quite unknown to the Constitution; the people cast their votes for the two or three pairs of candidates thus presented, and the electoral college simply registers the results. ”

“ If the independence of the legislature was to be maintained, some form of indirect popular choice was favored. But if the people were to elect, the larger States would have a decided advantage. Here was the old question in another form. The electoral scheme finally adopted was essentially a compromise. In most instances—Mason, of Virginia, said nineteen out of twenty times—it was believed that the electors would so scatter their votes [Pg 35] that no candidate would have a majority; consequently the Senate would make a choice from among the five candidates having the highest votes. ”

“ I had hoped that it was possible to secure a nonpartisan inquiry by means of a commission into evils the existence of which is known to all, and that out of this might grow legislation from which all thought of partisan advantage should be eliminated and only the higher thought appear of maintaining the freedom and purity of the ballot and the equality of the elector, without the guaranty of which the Government could never have been formed and without the continuance of which it can not continue to exist in peace and prosperity. ”

“ While one cannot dispute the basis for [Congress' concern that an election commission exist not in whole of presidential appointees] as a practical matter, it would seem that those who sought to challenge incumbent Congressmen might have equally good reason to fear a Commission which was unduly responsive to members of Congress whom they were seeking to unseat. ”

“ The men in charge, unwatched in their business, used it often for personal advantage, and were aided in this by the character of both the electoral machinery and the electorate. A multitude of offices had to be kept filled in every State and city by voters who could know little of the candidates and who accepted the recommendation implied in the party name. Control of the nominations meant control of the elections, and was within reach of those who were persistent in attending caucuses and conventions and were not too scrupulous in manipulating them. ”

“ However awkward or difficult it may be for Congress to resolve difficult electoral disputes, Congress, being a political body, expresses the people's will far more accurately than does an unelected Court. And the people's will is what elections are about.
Moreover, Congress was fully aware of the danger that would arise should it ask judges, unarmed with appropriate legal standards, to resolve a hotly contested Presidential election contest. Just after the 1876 Presidential election, Florida, South Carolina, and Louisiana each sent two slates of electors to Washington. ”

“ Federal law provides that if election results are contested in any state, and if the state, prior to election day, has enacted procedures to decide controversies or contests over electors and electoral votes, and if these procedures have been applied, and the decisions are made at least six days before the electors’ meetings, then the decisions are considered conclusive and will apply in counting the electoral votes. ”

“ The absurdities relative to double voting have been suppressed by the nomination of definite presidents and provisionary bureaux, by executive power. The age required for the electors has been reduced from thirty years to twenty-five, and for those eligible, from forty to thirty. It is conceded in advance that the new electoral law will lower the census as much for the electors as for those eligible, unless even that should be entirely suppressed.
“The succession to the Chamber of Peers has received a blow from which it cannot recover itself. ”

“ In the autumn of 1872, Sir Charles 'started a small Electoral Reform Committee.' Its purpose was to assist, first, the Bill of Mr. Trevelyan making the qualification for a vote in counties the same as in boroughs, and, secondly, his own resolution which demanded that seats should be redistributed in proportion to the number of electors. ”