Question

Discuss California National, state, and local voting system

Answer 1

Electoral systems used in California

The states have the authority to determine which electoral systems they will use in contests for state-level offices. The systems used in contests for federal office must adhere to federal constitutional guidelines, as well as applicable state laws.

Federal election

Article II, Section 1, of the United States Constitution provides that the President of the United States is elected by the Electoral College via majority vote in a single-winner contest. Of the 50 states, all but two award all of their presidential electors to the presidential candidate who wins a plurality of the popular vote in the state (Maine and Nebraska each award one of their electors to the candidate who wins a plurality of the statewide vote; the remaining electors are allocated to the winners of the plurality vote in the states' congressional districts).

Article I, Section 4, of the United States Constitution grants the states the authority to determine the rules by which they elect their United States Senators and Representatives, unless the United States Congress acts to change those rules:

State-level elections

Article I and the Seventeenth Amendment of the United States Constitution establish that each state selects two United States Senators in staggered elections. In 1967, the United States Congress passed a law requiring that each state establish single-winner districts and exclusively elect their United States Representatives from those districts. Consequently, in every state, United States Senators and United States Representatives are elected in single-winner contests. A majority of states determine winners in these contests via plurality vote. In California, winners in congressional contests are determined via plurality vote.

All elective state executive officers (e.g., governors, secretaries of state, treasurers, etc.) in the United States are selected via single-winner contests. A total of 40 states conduct only single-winner contests for their state legislative elections. The 10 remaining states conduct multi-winner contests for some state legislative seats: Arizona, Idaho, Maryland, New Hampshire, New Jersey, North Dakota, South Dakota, Vermont, Washington, and West Virginia. Plurality counts are generally used to determine electoral outcomes, though some states and jurisdictions use other tabulation methods (for example, Louisiana employs a majority voting/two-round system in which a runoff general election is held if no candidate for congressional or state-level office wins a majority of the vote in the first round of voting).