When electing a representative to a body of
representatives, winner-take-all elections don't sit right
with me. They set up the conditions that motivate
gerrymandering. If you're a member of an opposing party
living in a region dominated by one party, you may become
discouraged because it's
unlikely your vote will "count".
That inertia is very undemocratic because trends in the
voting demographics will tend to lag behind the actual
population demographics. Winner-take-all systems can
elect candidates who do not have the mandate of 49% of
their electorate. (It has been said that democracy is two
wolves and a sheep deciding what's for dinner.)
Proposed is a system where every candidate who wins a
percentage of the vote above a certain threshold
automatically "wins". Winning candidates will be sent to
the ruling body armed with a voting power equal to their
popular vote. John Doe might have 211,321 votes while his
colleague from the same district might have 212,457 votes,
where one vote in the ruling body is equivalent to one
electoral vote.
I don't think it would be a good idea for a candidate to be
allowed to split their legislative votes. There needs to be
clarity about where a candidate stands and about what
they're willing to do.
In the United States, political parties function to
consolidate votes for common interests that would
otherwise be splintered. I don't see this function going
away, but this system makes it less important. As long as a
grassroots movement can build up enough votes to be
viable, they'd be fine. The weighted representation would
likely be applied to the general election at first, and the
parties will need to work out for themselves how to make
their primary system compatible with this new system in
the general election.
Setting the right cutoff threshold is critical for a good
implementation of this idea. Setting it too low will clutter
the ruling body and lose the efficiency of a republic. (I
nominate myself, so I get one vote. Does that mean I get
the congressional healthcare benefits now?) Setting it too
high will favor established candidates and reduce the
responsiveness of the election to public opinion.