LODGE-GOSSETT FAVORS DEMOCRATS

Mr. DOUGLAS. Mr. President, as I look at these Lodge-Gossett figures for the last 19 elections, I notice that, in 17 of the 19 elections, the Democratic candidate would have received a larger electoral vote under the Lodge-Gossett plan than he was entitled to by his percentage of the popular vote. Conversely, the Republican's portion of the electoral vote would have been smaller than his portion of the popular vote in all 19 elections.

The Lodge-Gossett formula would handicap the Republicans because the Democrats could secure large blocs of electoral votes in the South, where relatively few popular votes will capture an electoral vote. In contrast, the Republicans would have to win the bulk of their electoral votes in the North, where more popular votes are required to gain an electoral vote. As shown in this table, which I shall ask to have inserted in the Record, Democratic leverage under the plan varies directly with southern solidarity and/or inversely with southern participation in the popular election. In other words, the more solid the South is and the fewer the southerners who vote in the popular election, the more the Lodge-Gossett formula will magnify Democraic strength.

I ask unanimous consent to have the table printed in the Record at this point. There being no objection, the table was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows:

1 "Southern solidarity" is an average percentage of the popular vote polled by Democrats in the Southern States, weighting cach State according to its electoral vote. This method must be used because it makes a great difference whether the Democrats poll 95 percent of the popular vote in a State with 3 or 23 electoral votes. The rank-difference coefficient of correlation between southern solidarity and Democratic advantage under the Lodge-Gossett plan is 0.588. The 11 Southern States are Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia.

Popular participation in the South compared to that in other States is a relation between the percent of the national popular vote polled in the South and the percent of the total electoral vote cast by the South. Popular participation in the South for 1924, for example, was measured as 36.63 percent, which means that, if the election had been determined by the nationwide popular vote regardless of State lines, the South would have had only 36.63 percent of the power she actually had in choosing the President. The rankdifference coefficient of correlation between Democratic advantage under the Lodge-Gossett plan and popular participation in the South is negative 0.568; the coefficient of multiple correlation between Democratic advantage, southern solidarity, and comparative southern popular participation (R1.23) is 0.684 (hearings, p. 336).

Mr. DOUGLAS. Mr. President, the Republican disadvantage under the LodgeGossett formula is not due to the magnified electoral power of the small States which results from giving the constant two electoral votes to all of the States and from giving one additional elector to Delaware, Nevada, and Wyoming, which do not always have the population quota requisite for the election of one Representative in all other States. Actually, the small States' electoral vote is usually rather evenly divided between our two major parties. If the magnified electoral power of the small States were the cause of the Republican handicap under the Lodge plan, we could expect the Democratic advantage to increase in proportion to the number of States carried under the Lodge formula. Actu

ally, the correlation is so small as to indicate neither a direct nor inverse relation between the Democratic advantage and the number of States carried under the Lodge plan. Prof. Ruth Silva found the rank-difference coefficient of correlation for the Republicans to be only negative 0.063 and only positive 0.114 for the Democrats-volume 44, American Political Science Review, page 94, note.

It is revealing to compare electoral-vote percentages under the Lodge formula with popular-vote percentages for a period when the South was not so solid. I ask unanimous consent to have printed at this point a table on that matter. There being no objection, the table was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows:

Mr. DOUGLAS. Mr. President, to the elections of 1864, 1868, 1872, and 1876, we may add two others. The Democrats would have suffered a disadvantage under the Lodge formula in 1892, when the Populists polled a sizable part of a relatively large popular vote in the South, and in 1948, when the States' Rights Party invaded southern democracy.

The reason for the Republican handicap under the Lodge-Gossett plan can be seen in the 1952 election. President Eisenhower received more popular votes than did any presidential candidate in American history. Although he would have been elected under the Lodge-Gossett plan-288.457 electoral votes to Stevenson's 240.241--the Lodge formula would have defeated him in spite of his popular majority, if the South had continued its customary voting habits in 1952. The average number of electoral votes given to the Republican candidate by the 11 Southern States under the Lodge formula in 8 previous elections, 1916 to 1948, was 27.9. In 1952, however, Eisenhower would have received 59.8 electoral votes in the 11 Southern States. Thus, Eisenhower's share of the southern electoral votes was 32 more than the average of previous Republican candidates. If 26 of these 32 electoral votes had gone to Stevenson, in conformity with tradition, Stevenson would have been elected with 266.241 electoral votes to Eisenhower's 262.457. In 1952, one southern electoral vote represented 66,863 popular votes. Therefore, Stevenson could have won an additional 26 Southern electoral votes by polling approximately 1,738,000 more popular votes in that area. The Lodge-Gossett plan would have allowed such a shift of 1,738,000 popular votes from Eisenhower to Stevenson in the South to have elected Stevenson, although Eisenhower still would have had a nationwide popular margin of nearly 3 million. In other words, the Lodge-Gossett formula would have defeated Eisenhower, the candidate who had an absolute majority of the popular vote.

One of the authors of this plan, former Senator Lodge, has said that the plan would not harm the Republican Party, because it would have given Thomas E. Dewey more electoral votes in 1948 than he actually received. Yes, it would have enlarged Dewey's electoral-vote consolation prize; but he would have lost the election nevertheless. Actually, the Lodge formula would also have given the Republican candidates more electoral votes in 1884, 1892, 1912, 1932, 1936, 1940, and 1944-all elections which they would have lost in any case. The same would be true for the Democrat in those elections in which the Democrat met

popular defeat-Hearings on House Joint Resolution 2, 81st Congress, 1st session, page 99. In general, it would enlarge the vote of the losing candidate; and in the case of a popularly defeated Democrat, it would enlarge his electoral vote sufficiently to endanger a Republican electoral victory in spite of the Republican popular victory.

LODGE-GOSSETT WOULD NOT PROMOTE TWO-PARTY SYSTEM IN THE SOUTH

Sponsors of this resolution have objected to applying the Lodge-Gossett or Mundt-Coudert formula to the statistics of past elections. "The candidates, the issues, and the popular vote would have been different," they say, "if our proposal had been in operation." This may be true: there might have been three rather than two, major party candidates; the problems of the large States and big cities might have been ignored; and at least two of the candidates might have been more conservative-one might even have been a South Carolinian. I am not willing to agree, however, that the Lodge-Gossett plan would produce a Republican-Democratic two-party system in the South.

The Republicans have no power in southern legislatures to enfranchise the Negroes and poor whites. As a matter of fact, I believe that those who now control southern legislatures would tighten up suffrage qualifications if they were threatened with a split in a State's electoral vote. Surely, those in control of southern legislatures would not extend the franchise to people who would use the vote to threaten their supremacy. In any case, as I said before, southern legislatures met the agrarian and populist challenge with a program of systematic disfranchisement.

Sponsors of this resolution claim that more southerners would vote in presidential elections because operation of the Lodge-Gossett plan would miraculously create real contests in the South. In other words, they argue that there are a number of southern Republicans who just do not bother to vote under the present system but who would vote in huge numbers if the Lodge plan were adopted. Well, first of all, I think southern legislatures would adopt the Mundt plan, rather than the Lodge plan, for reasons which I shall explain later.

Moreover, where would Republican votes come from in the South? I suppose the Republican Party might appeal to the southern racist who may not bother to vote now. That, however, would endanger the GOP's liberal and Negro support in the rest of the Nation. Can you not just imagine, Mr. President, what would happen to the Republican Party in the North if its presidential candidate approved racial segregation in order to woo southern voters. The other possibility is that the Republican Party might appeal to southern Negroes and poor whites. The trouble is that most of these people cannot vote. Furthermore, appeal to southern Negroes and liberals would alienate the conservatives to whom Republican economic and fiscal policy is most likely to appeal. Would not the Democratic South have trapped the Republican Party in a real box? Really, does not it sound foolish to speculate about where the Republicans can win more votes in the South? I think it does, because all of us are political realists enough to know that adoption of the Lodge plan will not produce southern Republicans.

During hearings on the Lodge-Gossett plan in the last four Congresses, several southerners said that adoption of the Lodge plan would not enlarge the Republican percentage of the southern vote. If this is true, as I believe it is, and if southern participation in popular elections remains limited, as I believe it will, then the Republican Party would be almost forced to try to decrease the South's voice in the electoral college, through enforcement of the second section of the 14th amendment. I think the Republican Party would be forced to this is a matter of sheer self-defense.

In the absence of action to reduce the southern electoral vote, adoption of the Lodge-Gossett plan would increase the importance of the South in national politics. I have before me some figures showing the southern electoral vote and the margin of electoral victory in the past 19 elections. I ask unanimous consent that this table be printed in the Record.

There being no objection, the table was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows:

The southern electoral vote and the margin of victory in presidential elections, 1880-1952

1 Election by Congress: 1880, 1892, 1896, 1900, 1908, 1912, 1924, and 1948. This table was taken from p. 338 of the hearings but adapted to fit the Mundt-Lodge-Gossett substitute, which requires a maj rity of the electoral vote in order to be elected. The 11 Southern States are: Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas, Tennessee, and Virginia.

Mr. DOUGLAS. Mr. President, these statistics show that, under the present system, the 11 Southern States held a balance of power in only 4 of the last 19 presidential elections-only in 1884, 1892, 1916, and 1948. In contrast, the Daniel version of the Lodge-Gossett plan, with the majority electoral-vote requirement, would have made southern electoral votes absolutely necessary for victory in every election except the one in 1904. In all the other elections, the withholding of southern electoral votes from the popular victor would have meant his certain defeat in the electoral college.

This would give to a minority-southern whites-an influence in presidential elections which would far exceed the influence of any metropolitan minority today. The fact is that Republicans and northern Democrats would be at the mercy of the South in national politics.

THE LOST-VOTE FALLACY

Sponsors of the Mundt-Lodge-Gossett resolution make a great deal out of what they call "lost votes" or votes "counted for the opposition." The argument runs something like this: Stevenson polled 90,000 votes in South Dakota, but all of South Dakotas electoral votes were cast for Eisenhower. Therefore, they argue that Stevenson's 90,000 votes were lost or counted for Eisenhower. Under their resolution, however, Eisenhower's 55 percent of the popular vote in the Nation might well have been lost if the Lodge formula had been used in the 39 Eisenhower States and the Mundt formula had been applied in the 9 Stevenson States, with Congress deciding who should be the President. What of the defeated majority with 55 percent of the popular vote?

I cannot be disturbed over this argument of lost votes. I think it is naive and without reason or logic. In every election, where there can be only a single winner, all votes cast for the losing candidate can be labeled either "lost" or "counted for the winner." The Mundt-Coudert plan would merely transfer the winner-take-all rule from the State level to the congressional district. The votes cast for the candidate who failed to carry the congressional district could be called either "lost" or "counted for the candidate" who did carry the district.

The Lodge-Gossett plan would merely transfer these so-called lost votes from the State to the national level. As former Senator Homer Ferguson has said, "the truth is that no votes are lost when validly cast in an election. They are actually counted toward the final decision; and, if insufficient for victory, they have simply exhausted their power as votes."

III-4. FIFTY PERCENT OF ELECTORAL VOTE NEEDED TO ELECT

In the substitute Daniel-Mundt-Kefauver amendment, Mr. President there is one provision which is perhaps the most dangerous proposal to our electoral system which has been seriously offered in many years. That is the proposal that if any candidate fails to receive a majority of the electoral vote, the Congress will meet to decide the issue. The language of the proposal reads as follows:

"The person having the greatest number of votes for President shall be the President, and the person having the greatest number of votes for Vice President shall be the Vice President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of electoral votes."

UNDER PRESENT PROPOSAL ALMOST HALF OF ELECTIONS SINCE 1880 WOULD HAVE BEEN DECIDED BY CONGRESS

Mr. President, I believe the method by which this amendment proposes to settle the election of a President, once it is thrown into Congress for decision, is an improvement over the present system in which each State is given one vote in the House. What the proponents of the proposal have overlooked-or perhaps some of them have not overlooked it-is that almost half the elections since 1880 would have been thrown into Congress for decision, if the LodgeGossett amendment had been operating. Furthermore, Mr. President, had the plan been in operation in these years, third parties would have been in a much stronger strategic position than at the present time, and one can only be led to the belief that all or almost all of the elections would have been decided by the Congress.

Mr. President, this on the face of it is such a ridiculous proposal that this fact alone should lead the Senate at least to recommit the proposal until the Committee has had time to study its full implications.

Now for the proof.

First, Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record a table which shows the total popular vote and the actual electoral vote by number and percentage for the Democrats and Republicans from the election of 1880 to that of 1952.

There being no objection, the table was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows:

Popular vote and electoral vote of presidential candidates, 1880–1952

(1,000)

Number Percent Number Percent Number Percent Number Percent Number Percent (1,000)