Law Commons^™

The Faithless Elector And 2016: Constitutional Uncertainty After The Election Of Donald Trump, Alexander Gouzoules

Faculty Publications

Presidential electors are generally expected to vote for the candidate who won their state's election, and those who do not are referred to as "faithless electors." A majority of states have laws of varying types that bind their electors to vote for the winning presidential candidate. The 2016 election, for the first time in modern history, produced a serious movement urging electors to cast faithless votes against Donald Trump. Although this movement was not successful, 2016 saw the most faithless electors in recent history by a large margin. Three separate, ultimately unsuccessful, lawsuits were filed by would-be faithless electors in …

The Right To Vote Under Local Law, Joshua A. Douglas

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

A complete analysis of the right to vote requires at least three levels of inquiry: the U.S. Constitution and federal law, state constitutions and state law, and local laws that confer voting rights for municipal elections. But most voting rights scholarship focuses on only federal or state law and omits any discussion of the third category. This Article—the first to explore in depth the local right to vote—completes the trilogy. Cities and towns across the country are expanding the right to vote in municipal elections to include sixteen- and seventeen-year-olds, noncitizens, nonresident property owners, and others. Berkeley, California, for example, …

Local Democracy On The Ballot, Joshua A. Douglas

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

This Essay, focusing particularly on voter-backed local election rules, proceeds in three parts. Part I highlights how local laws play a significant role in dictating voting rights and election rules. Too often election law scholars focus solely on federal or state law. But local laws are also important in defining the right to vote and providing rules for our democracy. New local election law experiments in one place can highlight innovative reforms that other cities and states may eventually adopt. This avenue to election law reform is particularly important given the current political climate.

Part II considers local ballot initiatives …