Category Archives: theory

How to tell if an election result is valid?

January 9, 2022, 1:03 pmpolitical polarization, theoryNed Foley

In advance of the 2020 election, I devoted a significant portion of my scholarship to this issue: given an official announcement (or certification) of an election’s result, how are citizens, journalists, judges–all of us–to determine whether the result should be… Continue reading

Democrats, democracy, and “the Portman problem”

September 16, 2021, 9:40 amalternative voting systems, election subversion risk, political parties, primaries, theoryNed Foley

Can one party save democracy by itself? I don’t think so, but that seems to be the view of some, as nicely captured by Ed Kilgore in responding to my blog post How Best to End “Electoral McCarthyism”? Kilgore acknowledges:… Continue reading

Newsom recall lawsuit

August 17, 2021, 6:42 amcourt decisions, political equality, recall elections, Supreme Court, theoryNed Foley

Politico has a story on a new federal lawsuit raising a constitutional challenge to the procedures that California uses for its gubernatorial recall. The lawsuit follows upon a NY Times op-ed from last week by Erwin Chemerinsky and Aaron Edlin,… Continue reading

An important post for an important initiative

July 28, 2021, 8:00 amtheoryNed Foley

The Ash Center at Harvard is seeking a Research Fellow to help guide a new initiative on Reimagining Democracy. Details here.

Breaking round-robin ties

July 27, 2021, 8:53 amalternative voting systems, theoryranked choice votingNed Foley

The USA women’s soccer team is advancing out of the preliminary round-robin stage of competition based on a “goal differential” tiebreaker used to differentiate teams with the same win-loss records. “The United States finished second in Group G on the… Continue reading

Could you withstand the pressure?

July 25, 2021, 7:17 pmalternative voting systems, election subversion risk, primaries, theoryNed Foley

Two articles, one in The Atlantic and the other in The New York Times, discuss how first-term Representative Nancy Mace–a Republican from South Carolina–initially condemned Trump for causing the January 6 insurrection, only to backtrack since then.… Continue reading

“The Democracy Constitution” proposal

July 22, 2021, 5:59 amtheoryconstitutional amendment, representationNed Foley

Rick’s new essay on the length of House terms got me thinking about the project recently undertaken by the Democracy to draft a proposed whole new constitution for the United States. I don’t recall seeing mention of this project on… Continue reading

Tournament Elections with Round-Robin Primaries

July 20, 2021, 9:04 amalternative voting systems, ballot access, political polarization, primaries, theory, votingranked choice votingNed Foley

I’ve posted a draft of this paper on SSRN. Here’s the abstract: Round-robin voting uses ranked-choice ballots but calculates which candidates are most preferred by a majority of voters differently from instant-runoff voting. Like a round-robin sports competition, round-robin… Continue reading

Effect of Primaries on Electoral Outcomes?

July 19, 2021, 10:01 ampolitical polarization, primaries, theory, votingranked-choice votingNed Foley

Geoffrey Skelley at 538 has a piece on Lee Drutman’s very important new report analyzing the effect of primary elections on general election outcomes. (I mentioned this report in a previous blog post.) As Skelley explains, Drutman’s report is… Continue reading

J.D. Vance and the pressures of primaries

July 9, 2021, 7:20 ampolitical polarization, primaries, theoryranked choice votingNed Foley

In a remarkably candid TIME interview with Molly Ball after announcing his candidacy in Ohio’s 2022 U.S. Senate election, for the seat being vacated by Rob Portman, J.D. Vance acknowledged that he’s pandering to ex-president Trump because that’s the only… Continue reading

“The Constitutional Right of Self-Government”

October 12, 2020, 8:45 amtheoryRick Hasen

Nikolas Bowie has posted this draft on SSRN (forthcoming, Yale LJ). Here is the abstract: The Assembly Clause is the ugly duckling of the First Amendment. Brooding in the shadow of the heralded Free Speech Clause and the venerated Religion… Continue reading

“Democratic Legitimacy under Conditions of Severely Depressed Voter Turnout”

May 29, 2020, 8:07 amtheoryRick Hasen

Jim Gardner has posted this draft on SSRN (forthcoming, U Chicago L Rev Online). Here is the abstract: Due to the present pandemic, it seems increasingly likely that the 2020 general election in November will be held under conditions of… Continue reading

Election-related options still to come at AALS

January 3, 2020, 4:47 pmcensus litigation, election law and constitutional law, The Voting Wars, theory, votingJustin Levitt

Rick already mentioned a few of the exceptional election-related events at AALS so far. There are still several to come, including my stint tomorrow at 8:30 as least valuable player on a 2020 census panel with Dale Ho, Christina Mora,… Continue reading

“The Law of Electoral Democracy: Theory and Purpose”

November 7, 2019, 5:06 pmtheoryRick Hasen

Looking forward to reading this from Graeme Orr: This chapter explores the question of ‘theory’ within the law of electoral democracy, by considering what it would mean for such a theory to exist given the contested nature of democracy itself.It… Continue reading