Voters should have say in how president elected

ON Tuesday Gov. Chris Gregoire signed into law a bill that aims to change the way Americans elect the president and vice-president of the United States. This was a big thing done with little public notice, and is disturbing in its implications.

Senate Bill 5599 — sponsored by Sens. Joe McDermott, Jeanne Kohl-Welles and Adam Kline of Seattle and seven other Senate Democrats — is part of a plan to do an appendectomy on the Electoral College, the institution under which the states choose the president and vice president.

The states all decided ages ago to cast their electoral votes based on the outcome of the popular vote in their state, with all but two states casting all their votes based on the statewide totals.

The objection to this is that occasionally, when the national popular vote is close, the Electoral College can go the other way. When that happened in 2000, Americans talked of amending the Constitution. It is possible to do that — it has been amended 12 times in the past century — but amendments require wide support, and ending the Electoral College didn't have it.

The bill signed by Gregoire would achieve the same result by having the states game the system. Once activated, all the states in the agreement will cast their electoral votes for the candidate with the highest popular vote (not necessarily a majority) nationwide. If that agreement had been in effect in 2004, Washington would have had to cast its 11 electoral votes for George W. Bush, even though John Kerry won 53 percent of the popular vote here.

Washington's promise to cast its electoral votes that way is not binding until states with a majority of electoral votes pass the same law. So far only five — Washington, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland and New Jersey — have done so. That means there is time for other states to consider this proposal more deeply than we have — and for people here to make up that lack by signing a petition for referendum so that the question can be referred to the people.

It is, after all, their business.