Letters

SIZE DOESN'T MATTER...

Washington, DC

Katha Pollitt is right in her August 16/23 "Subject to Debate" column that small states have more electoral votes than they "should" according to a strict population count, owing to the constitutional malapportionment of the Senate. However, she overlooks the complicating factor that the population advantage to small states is largely canceled by the fact that all states, by law or custom, still award their Electoral College (EC) votes winner take all, which benefits large states. To wit, if a presidential candidate wins North Dakota by 537 votes this year, he gets three EC votes. But if the candidate wins Florida by that number, as Bush did (by the official tally) in 2000, he gets twenty-seven.

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