National Popular Vote Interstate Compact

Opponents of a national popular vote contend that the Electoral College serves to protect the country from the election of a person who is unfit to be president. Certain founders conceived of the Electoral College as a deliberative body which would weigh the inputs of the states, but not be bound by them, in selecting the president.[21] However, the Electoral College has never served such a role in practice. From 1796 onward, presidential electors have acted as "rubber stamps" for their parties' nominees. As of 2016, no election outcome has been determined by an elector deviating from the will of their state,[22] and thirty-two states and the District of Columbia have laws to prevent such "faithless electors",[23][24] though cases regarding the constitutionality of such laws are currently pending before the Supreme Court.[25] Moreover, the National Popular Interstate Compact does not eliminate the Electoral College or affect faithless elector laws; it merely changes the way in which electors are pledged by the participating states.

Advertising and visits by major-party candidates during final stretch of the 2004 presidential campaign (Sept. 26 – Nov. 2, 2004)[26]

Spending on advertising per capita:   < $0.50   $0.50 – 1.00   $1.00 – 2.00   $2.00 – 4.00   > $4.00 Campaign visits per 1 million residents:   No visits   0 – 1.0   1.0 – 3.0   3.0 – 9.0   > 9.0

Under the current system, campaign focus – in terms of spending, visits, and attention paid to regional or state issues – is largely limited to the few swing states whose electoral outcomes are competitive, with politically "solid" states mostly ignored by the campaigns. The adjacent maps illustrate the amount spent on advertising and the number of visits to each state, relative to population, by the two major-party candidates in the last stretch of the 2004 presidential campaign. Supporters of the compact contend that a national popular vote would encourage candidates to campaign with equal effort for votes in competitive and non-competitive states alike.[27] Critics of the compact argue that candidates would have less incentive to focus on states with smaller populations or fewer urban areas, and would thus be less motivated to address rural issues.[19][28]

Opponents of the compact have raised concerns about the handling of close or disputed outcomes. National Popular Vote contends that the election being decided on the basis of a disputed tally is far less likely under the NPVIC, which creates one large nationwide pool of voters, than under the current system, in which the national winner may be determined by an extremely small margin in any one of the fifty-one smaller statewide tallies.[28] However, it is possible for the national popular vote to be closer than the vote tally within any one state. In the event of an exact tie in the nationwide tally, NPVIC member states will award their electors to the winner of the popular vote in their state.[29] Under the NPVIC, each state will continue to handle disputes and statewide recounts as governed by their own laws.[30] The NPVIC does not include any provision for a nationwide recount, though Congress has the authority to create such a provision.[31]

Pete du Pont argues that, in 2000, "Mr. Gore's 540,000-vote margin amounted to 3.1 votes in each of the country's 175,000 precincts. 'Finding' three votes per precinct in urban areas is not a difficult thing...".[19] However, National Popular Vote contends that electoral fraud affecting the outcome would be more difficult to achieve under a national popular vote than under the current system, because of the greater number of votes that would likely need to be shifted – under the current system, a close election may be determined by the outcome in just one "tipping point" state, the margin of which is likely to be far smaller than the nationwide margin. This is due to the smaller pool of voters at the state level, and the fact that several states may have close results.[28]

Historical partisan advantage relative to the popular vote, demonstrating that neither major party holds a consistent advantage. (Positive values indicate a Republican advantage and negative values indicate a Democratic advantage.)[32]

Some supporters and opponents of the NPVIC believe it gives one party an advantage relative to the current Electoral College system. Former Delaware Governor Pete du Pont, a Republican, has argued that the compact would be an "urban power grab" and benefit Democrats.[19] However, Saul Anuzis, former chairman of the Michigan Republican Party, wrote that Republicans "need" the compact, citing what he believes to be the center-right nature of the American electorate.[33]

A statistical analysis by FiveThirtyEight's Nate Silver of all presidential elections from 1864 to 2016 (see adjacent chart) found that the Electoral College has not consistently favored one major party or the other, and that any advantage in the Electoral College does not tend to last long, noting that "there's almost no correlation between which party has the Electoral College advantage in one election and which has it four years later."[32] Although in all four elections since 1876 in which the winner lost the popular vote, the Republican became president, Silver's analysis shows that such splits are about equally likely to favor either major party.[32] A popular vote-Electoral College split favoring the Democrat John Kerry nearly occurred in 2004.[34]

New Yorker essayist Hendrik Hertzberg also concluded that the NPVIC would benefit neither party, noting that historically both Republicans and Democrats have been successful in winning the popular vote in presidential elections.[35]

State population per electoral vote from the 2010 census

There is some debate over whether the Electoral College favors small- or large-population states. Those who argue that the College favors low-population states point out that such states have proportionally more electoral votes relative to their populations.[note 1][18][36] In the least-populous states, with three electors, this results in voters having 143% greater voting power than they would under purely proportional allocation, while in the most populous state, California, voters' power is 16% smaller than under proportional allocation. The NPVIC would give equal weight to each voter's ballot, regardless of what state they live in.

Others, however, believe that since most states award electoral votes on a winner-takes-all system (the "unit rule"), the potential of populous states to shift greater numbers of electoral votes gives them more clout than would otherwise be expected.[37][38][39]

Opponents of a national popular vote contend that the Electoral College is a fundamental component of the federal system established by the Constitutional Convention. Specifically, the Connecticut Compromise established a bicameral legislature – with proportional representation of the states in the House of Representatives and equal representation of the states in the Senate – as a compromise between less populous states fearful of having their interests dominated and voices drowned out by larger states,[40] and larger states which viewed anything other than proportional representation as an affront to principles of democratic representation.[41] The Electoral College extends the Connecticut Compromise from the Legislative Branch to the Executive Branch by assigning each state a number of electoral votes equal to their representation in both the House of Representatives and the Senate. A national popular vote, opponents argue, would create an imbalance in the federal system by keeping the Connecticut Compromise for the Legislative Branch and removing it from the Executive Branch.

Two governors who have vetoed NPVIC legislation, Arnold Schwarzenegger of California and Linda Lingle of Hawaii, both in 2007, objected to the compact on the grounds that it could require their states' electoral votes to be awarded to a candidate who did not win a majority in their state. (Both states have since enacted laws joining the compact.) Supporters of the compact counter that under a national popular vote system, state-level majorities are irrelevant; in any state, votes contribute to the nationwide tally, which determines the winner. The preferences of individual voters are thus paramount, while state-level majorities are an obsolete intermediary measure.[42][43][44]

The Compact Clause of Article I, Section X of the United States Constitution states that "No State shall, without the Consent of Congress ... enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State".[45] In a report released in October 2019, the Congressional Research Service (CRS) cited the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in Virginia v. Tennessee (1893) – reaffirmed in U.S. Steel Corp. v. Multistate Tax Commission (1978) and Cuyler v. Adams (1981)[46] – as stating that the words "agreement" and "compact" are synonyms, and that explicit congressional consent of interstate compacts is not required for agreements "which the United States can have no possible objection or have any interest in interfering with".[47] However, the report asserted, the Court required explicit congressional consent for interstate compacts that are "directed to the formation of any combination tending to the increase of political power in the States, which may encroach upon or interfere with the just supremacy of the United States" — meaning where the vertical balance of power between the federal government and state governments is altered in favor of state governments.

The CRS report states that "Whether the NPV initiative requires congressional consent under the Compact Clause first requires a determination as to whether NPV even constitutes an interstate compact."[48] Yale Law School professor Akhil Amar, one of the compact's framers, has argued that because the NPVIC does not create a "new interstate governmental apparatus" and because "cooperating states acting together would be exercising no more power than they are entitled to wield individually", the NPVIC probably does not constitute an interstate compact and cannot contravene the Compact Clause.[49] Conversely, the CRS report cites the Court's opinion in Northeast Bancorp v. Federal Reserve Board of Governors (1985) as suggesting that a requirement of a new interstate governmental entity is a sufficient but not a necessary condition to qualify an agreement as being an interstate compact under the Compact Clause.[48] Instead, the CRS report cites the Court's opinions in Virginia v. Tennessee and Northeast Bancorp as stating that any agreement between two or more states that "cover[s] all stipulations affecting the conduct or claims of the parties", prohibits members from "modify[ing] or repeal[ing] [the agreement] unilaterally", and requires "'reciprocation' of mutual obligations" constitutes an interstate compact. Noting that the NPVIC meets all of those requirements, the CRS report concludes that "the initiative can be described as an interstate compact."[48]

As part of concerns about whether the NPVIC would shift power from the federal government to state governments, at least two legal scholars have suggested that the NPVIC would require explicit congressional approval because it would remove the possibility of contingent elections for President being conducted by the U.S. House of Representatives under the 12th Amendment.[50][51] The CRS report notes that only two presidential elections (1800 and 1824) have been determined by a contingent election, and whether the loss of such elections would be a de minimis diminishment of federal power is unresolved by the relevant case law. The report does reference U.S. Steel Corp. v. Multistate Tax Commission as stating that the "pertinent inquiry [with respect to the Compact Clause] is one of potential, rather than actual, impact on federal supremacy" in that the potential erosion of an enumerated power of the U.S. House of Representatives could arguably require congressional approval.[47] Proponents of the compact counter that if removing the possibility of contingent elections is grounds for unconstitutionality, then Congress setting the size of the House at an odd number, as it did in 1911 (resulting in an odd number of electors until 1961), was also unconstitutional.[52][53]

The CRS report goes on to cite the Supreme Court's rulings in Florida v. Georgia (1855) and in Texas v. New Mexico and Colorado (2018) as recognizing that explicit congressional consent is also required for interstate compacts that alter the horizontal balance of power amongst state governments.[48] University of Colorado Law School professor Jennifer S. Hendricks has argued that the NPVIC would not alter the power of non-compacting state governments because all state governments would retain their right to select the electors of their choosing.[54] Bloomberg Law editor Michael Brody has argued that "the role of electors has yet to be defined by a court," and cites the Supreme Court ruling in Ray v. Blair (1952) as suggesting that the 12th Amendment does not require that electors must vote for the candidate whom they are pledged to. Brody notes that because the NPVIC only binds state legislatures and not electors, those electors would retain independent withdrawal power as faithless electors at the request of the compacting states unless the compacting states adopt criminal penalties or other statutes that bind the electors – which 10 of the 15 current member states and the District of Columbia currently do, in addition to 19 other states.[55][56] On January 17, 2020, the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case Chiafalo v. Washington, which will determine whether criminal penalties for faithless electors violate the electors' 1st Amendment rights.

Other legal scholars have argued that the power of non-compacting states would be altered because, under the NPVIC, a state's power in determining the outcomes of presidential elections would be changed from the percentage of electors it has in the electoral college to the state's percentage of the popular vote, rendering the right of non-compacting state governments to appoint their own electors moot.[50][57][58][59] Additionally, Ian J. Drake, an associate professor of political science and law at Montclair State University, has argued that because Cuyler v. Adams held that congressional approval of interstate compacts makes them federal laws,[60] Congress cannot consent to the NPVIC without violating the Supremacy Clause, because under Article I, Section VIII, Congress has no enumerated or implied powers to alter the presidential election process except as part of the constitutional amendment process.[59][61] Labor lawyer Bradley T. Turflinger and the organizers of NPV Inc. dispute Drake's conclusion, and the NPV Inc. organizers have stated that they plan to seek congressional approval if the compact is approved by a sufficient number of states.[62][63] Citing Drake,[59] the CRS report concludes that if the NPVIC were to be enacted by the necessary number of states, it would likely become the source of considerable litigation, and it is likely that the Supreme Court will be involved in any resolution of the constitutional issues surrounding it.[48]

Proponents of the compact, such as law professors Akhil and Vikram Amar (the compact's original framers),[64] as well as U.S. Representative Jamie Raskin from Maryland's 8th congressional district (a former law professor),[65] have argued that state legislatures have the plenary power to appoint electors in accordance with the national popular vote under the Elections Clause of Article II, Section I,[66] which states that "Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress".[45] Vikram Amar, along with other legal scholars, have also cited the Supreme Court's rulings in McPherson v. Blacker (1892) and Arizona State Legislature v. Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission (2015) as recognizing that states have wide discretion in selecting the method by which they appoint their electors.[67][68][69]

However, the CRS report cites the Supreme Court's opinion in McPherson v. Blacker as stating that state legislatures have "conceded plenary power ... in the matter of the appointment of electors," and citing the Court's opinions in Williams v. Rhodes (1968) and Oregon v. Mitchell (1970) that struck down state laws concerning the appointment of electors that violated the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment, the CRS report concludes that a state's power to select the method by which its electors are appointed is not absolute.[70] Robert Natelson, a senior fellow at the libertarian Independence Institute in constitutional jurisprudence and a member of the conservative American Legislative Exchange Council's board of scholars, has also argued that a state legislature's power to appoint its electors cannot be absolute because otherwise states would be permitted to appoint their electors in a manner that would violate public trust (e.g. by holding an auction to sell their electoral votes to the highest bidder).[51] Natelson has also argued that US states' power to select electors must also be compatible in a substantive sense with the general US constitutional scheme for US presidential elections that gives smaller US states disproportionate weight relative to their population in selecting the US President.[51] The NPVIC would allegedly be incompatible with this general US constitutional scheme as a substantive matter (as opposed to as a formal matter) because it would de facto eliminate the disproportionate weight that smaller US states have relative to their population in selecting the US President.[51]

Additionally, the CRS report notes that while the Court's opinion in McPherson v. Blacker emphasized that the variety of state laws that existed shortly after the ratification of the Constitution indicates that state legislatures have multiple alternative "modes of choosing the electors", the Court did not identify selecting electors in accordance with the results of the national popular vote as one of them. This is because, according to the CRS report, there appears to be no evidence contemporaneous with the ratification of the Constitution of a state selecting its electors in such a manner, and the CRS report cites the Court's opinion in U.S. Term Limits, Inc. v. Thornton (1995) as concluding that states cannot exercise their enumerated powers under Article I or Article II in a way that would "effect a fundamental change in the constitutional structure" (except as outlined in Article V as part of the constitutional amendment process),[70] a view at least three legal scholars have argued applies for the NPVIC.[61][71][51]

A 2008 Columbia Law Review article by Columbia Law School student David Gringer suggested that the NPVIC could potentially violate Sections 2 and 5 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (VRA).[71] However, in 2012, the U.S. Justice Department Civil Rights Division declined to challenge California's entry into the NPVIC under Section 5 of the Act, and the October 2019 CRS report notes that the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Shelby County v. Holder (2013), which invalidated Section 4(b) of the VRA, has rendered Section 5 currently inoperable.[70] In response to Gringer's argument that the NPVIC would violate Section 2 of the VRA, FairVote's Rob Richie says that the NPVIC "treats all voters equally",[72] and NPV Inc. has stated "The National Popular Vote bill manifestly would make every person's vote for President equal throughout the United States in an election to fill a single office (the Presidency). It is entirely consistent with the goal of the Voting Rights Act."[73]

Public opinion surveys suggest that a majority or plurality of Americans support a popular vote for President. Gallup polls dating back to 1944 showed consistent majorities of the public supporting a direct vote.[74] A 2007 Washington Post and Kaiser Family Foundation poll found that 72% favored replacing the Electoral College with a direct election, including 78% of Democrats, 60% of Republicans, and 73% of independent voters.[75]

A November 2016 Gallup poll following the 2016 U.S. presidential election showed that Americans' support for amending the U.S. Constitution to replace the Electoral College with a national popular vote fell to 49%, with 47% opposed. Republican support for replacing the Electoral College with a national popular vote dropped significantly, from 54% in 2011 to 19% in 2016, which Gallup attributed to a partisan response to the 2016 result, where the Republican candidate won the Electoral College despite losing the popular vote.[76] In March 2018, a Pew Research Center poll showed that 55% of Americans supported replacing the Electoral College with a national popular vote, with 41% opposed, but that a partisan divide remained in that support, as 75% of self-identified Democrats supported replacing the Electoral College with a national popular vote, while only 32% of self-identified Republicans did.[77]

Several proposals to abolish the Electoral College by constitutional amendment have been introduced in Congress over the decades. These efforts have, however, been hampered because a two-thirds vote in both the House and Senate are required to send an amendment to the states where ratification by three-fourths of the State legislatures or by conventions in three fourths of the states is required for it to become operative.

Distribution of electoral votes following the 2010 Census

In 2001, Northwestern University law professor Robert W. Bennett suggested a plan in an academic publication to implement a National Popular Vote through a mechanism that would embrace state legislatures' power to appoint electors, rather than resist that power.[78] By coordinating, states constituting a majority of the Electoral College could effectively implement a popular vote.

Law professors (and brothers) Akhil Reed Amar and Vikram Amar defended the constitutionality of such a plan.[79] They proposed that a group of states, through legislation, form a compact wherein they agree to give all of their electoral votes to the national popular vote winner, regardless of the balance of votes in their own state. These state laws would only be triggered once the compact included enough states to control a majority of the electoral college (270 votes), thus guaranteeing that the national popular vote winner would also win the electoral college.

The academic plan uses two constitutional features:

• Presidential Electors Clause, Article 2, section 1, clause 2, which gives each state the power to determine the manner in which its electors are selected.
• Compact Clause, Article I, section 10, clause 3, under which it creates an enforceable compact.

The Amar brothers noted that such a plan could be enacted by the passage of laws in as few as eleven states and would probably not require congressional approval, though this is not certain (see § Constitutionality above).

In 2006, John Koza, a computer science professor at Stanford, was the lead author of Every Vote Equal, a book that makes a detailed case for his plan for an interstate compact to establish National Popular Vote.[80] (Koza had previously had exposure to interstate compacts from his work with state lottery commissions after inventing the scratch-off lottery ticket.)[80] That year, Koza, Barry Fadem and others formed National Popular Vote, a non-profit group to promote the legislation. The group has a transpartisan advisory committee including former US Senators Jake Garn, Birch Bayh, and David Durenberger, and former Representatives John Anderson, John Buchanan, and Tom Campbell.[81]

By the time of the group's opening news conference in February 2006, the proposed interstate compact had been introduced in the Illinois legislature.[82] With backing from National Popular Vote, the NPVIC legislation was introduced in five additional state legislatures in the 2006 session.[83][84][85] It passed in the Colorado Senate[86] and in both houses of the California legislature before being vetoed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger.[87][88]

In 2007, NPVIC legislation was introduced in 42 states. It was passed by at least one legislative chamber in Arkansas,[89] California,[42] Colorado,[90] Illinois,[91] New Jersey,[92] North Carolina,[93] Maryland, and Hawaii.[94] Maryland became the first state to join the compact when Governor Martin O'Malley signed it into law on April 10, 2007.[95]

NPVIC legislation has been introduced in all 50 states.[1] As of March 2020, the NPVIC has been adopted by fifteen states and the District of Columbia. Together, they have 196 electoral votes, which is 36.4% of the Electoral College and 72.6% of the 270 votes needed to give the compact legal force. As of July 2019, no Republican governor has signed the NPVIC into law.

In Nevada, the legislation passed both chambers in 2019, but was vetoed by Gov. Steve Sisolak on May 30, 2019.[96] In Maine, the legislation also passed both chambers in 2019, but failed the additional enactment vote in the House.[97] States where only one chamber has passed the legislation are Arizona, Arkansas, Michigan, Minnesota, North Carolina, Oklahoma, and Virginia. Bills seeking to repeal the compact in Connecticut, Maryland, New Jersey and Washington have failed.[98]

Total
Electoral
Votes of
Adoptive
States

'06

'07

'08

'09

'10

'11

'12

'13

'14

'15

'16

'17

'18

'19

0

30

60

90

120

150

180

210

240

270

MD

NJ

IL

HI

WA

MA

DC

VT

CA

RI

NY

CT

CO

DE

NM

OR

← 196 (72.6% of 270)

270 electoral votes

First
legislative
introduction

Reapportionment
based on
2010 Census

History of state enactment of the NPVIC as of January 2020

Jurisdictions enacting law to join the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact

No.	Jurisdiction	Date adopted	Method of adoption	Current Electoral votes (EV)
1	Maryland	Apr 10, 2007	Signed by Gov. Martin O'Malley[95]	10
2	New Jersey	Jan 13, 2008	Signed by Gov. Jon Corzine[99]	14
3	Illinois	Apr 7, 2008	Signed by Gov. Rod Blagojevich[91]	20
4	Hawaii	May 1, 2008	Legislature overrode veto of Gov. Linda Lingle[100]	4
5	Washington	Apr 28, 2009	Signed by Gov. Christine Gregoire[101]	12
6	Massachusetts	Aug 4, 2010	Signed by Gov. Deval Patrick[102]	11
7	D.C.	Dec 7, 2010	Signed by Mayor Adrian Fenty[103][note 2]	3
8	Vermont	Apr 22, 2011	Signed by Gov. Peter Shumlin[104]	3
9	California	Aug 8, 2011	Signed by Gov. Jerry Brown[105]	55
10	Rhode Island	Jul 12, 2013	Signed by Gov. Lincoln Chafee[106]	4
11	New York	Apr 15, 2014	Signed by Gov. Andrew Cuomo[107]	29
12	Connecticut	May 24, 2018	Signed by Gov. Dannel Malloy[108]	7
13	Colorado	Mar 15, 2019	Signed by Gov. Jared Polis[109]	9
14	Delaware	Mar 28, 2019	Signed by Gov. John Carney[110]	3
15	New Mexico	Apr 3, 2019	Signed by Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham[111]	5
16	Oregon	Jun 12, 2019	Signed by Gov. Kate Brown[112]	7
Total				196
Percentage of the 270 EVs needed				72.6%

In Maine, an initiative to join the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact began collecting signatures on April 17, 2016. It failed to collect enough signatures to appear on the ballot.[113][114] In Arizona, a similar initiative began collecting signatures on December 19, 2016, but failed to collect the required 150,642 signatures by July 5, 2018.[115][116] In Missouri, an initiative did not collect the required number of signatures before the deadline of May 6, 2018.[117][118]

A referendum in Colorado seeking to overturn the state's adoption of the compact is scheduled to appear on the November 2020 ballot; that state's membership is suspended pending the outcome of the referendum.[2][119]

Psephologist Nate Silver noted in 2014 that all jurisdictions that had adopted the compact at that time were blue states, and that there were not enough electoral votes from the remaining blue states to achieve the required majority. He concluded that, as swing states were unlikely to support a compact that reduces their influence, the compact could not succeed without adoption by some red states as well.[120] Republican-led chambers have adopted the measure in New York (2011),[121] Oklahoma (2014), and Arizona (2016), and the measure has been unanimously approved by Republican-led committees in Georgia and Missouri, prior to the 2016 election.[122]

On March 15, 2019, Colorado became the first "purple" state to join the compact, though no Republican legislators supported the bill and Colorado had a state government trifecta under Democrats.[123]

Based on population estimates, some states that have passed the compact are projected to lose one or two electoral votes due to congressional apportionment following the 2020 Census, which then might increase the number of additional states needed to adopt the measure.[124]

The table below lists all state bills to join the NPVIC introduced or otherwise filed in a state's current or most recent legislative session.[98] This includes all bills that are law, pending or have failed. The "EVs" column indicates the number of electoral votes each state has.

State	EVs	Session	Bill	Latest Action	Lower house	Upper house	Executive	Status
Delaware	3	2019–20	SB 22[125]	Mar 28, 2019	Passed 24–17	Passed 14–7	Signed	Law
Florida	29	2020	HB 335[126]	Mar 14, 2020	Withdrawn	—	—	Failed
			SB 908[127]	Mar 14, 2020	—	Withdrawn	—
Georgia	16	2019–20	SB 42[128]	Feb 5, 2019	—	In committee	—	Pending
Kansas	6	2019–20	SB 115[129]	Feb 7, 2019	—	In committee	—	Pending
Maine	4	2019–20	LD 418[130]	Mar 14, 2019	Died in committee	Died in committee	—	Failed
			LD 816[97]	Jun 19, 2019	Failed 66–76	Passed 19–16	—
					Passed 77–69	Insisted 21–14
					Enactment failed 68–79	Enacted 18–16
					Enactment failed 69–74	Insisted on enactment
Minnesota	10	2019–20	HF 1603[131]	Apr 26, 2019	In committee	—	—	Pending
			HF 1941[132]	Mar 27, 2019	In committee	—	—
			HF 2117[133]	Mar 18, 2019	In committee	—	—
			HF 3237[134]	Feb 13, 2020	In committee	—	—
			SF 34[135]	Jan 14, 2019	—	In committee	—
			SF 189[136]	Feb 11, 2019	—	In committee	—
			SF 2227[137]	May 1, 2019	Passed 73–58	Not voted[lower-alpha 1]	—
			SF 2984[138]	Feb 11, 2020	—	In committee	—
Mississippi	6	2020	HB 369[139]	Apr 9, 2020	Died in committee	—	—	Failed
Missouri	10	2020	HB 1591[140]	Jan 9, 2020	Introduced	—	—	Pending
			HB 1949[141]	Jan 9, 2020	Introduced	—	—
			HB 1988[142]	Jan 9, 2020	Introduced	—	—
New Hampshire	4	2019–20	HB 541[143]	Jan 8, 2020	In committee	—	—	Pending
North Carolina	15	2019–20	SB 104[144]	Feb 25, 2019	—	In committee	—	Pending
Ohio	18	2019–20	HB 70[145]	Feb 20, 2019	In committee	—	—	Pending
Pennsylvania	20	2019–20	SB 270[146]	Jul 9, 2019	—	In committee	—	Pending
South Carolina	9	2019–20	H 3209[147]	Jan 8, 2019	In committee	—	—	Pending
			H 4277[148]	Mar 20, 2019	In committee	—	—
Virginia	13	2020	HB 177[149]	Feb 25, 2020	Passed 51–46	Postponed until 2021	—	Pending
			HB 199[150]	Jan 31, 2020	Died in committee	—	—
			SB 399[151]	Jan 28, 2020	—	Died in committee	—
West Virginia	5	2020	HB 4575[152]	Jan 28, 2020	In committee	—	—	Pending
Wisconsin	10	2019–20	AB 185[153]	Apr 9, 2020	Died in committee	—	—	Failed
			SB 197[154]	Apr 9, 2020	—	Died in committee	—

The table below lists past bills that received a floor vote (a vote by the full chamber) in at least one chamber of the state's legislature. Bills that failed without a floor vote are not listed. The "EVs" column indicates the number of electoral votes the state had at the time of the latest vote on the bill. This number may have changed since then due to reapportionment after the 2010 Census.

State	EVs	Session	Bill	Lower house	Upper house	Executive	Outcome
Arizona	11	2016	HB 2456[155]	Passed 40–16	Died in committee	—	Failed
Arkansas	6	2007	HB 1703[156]	Passed 52–41	Died in committee	—	Failed
		2009	HB 1339[157]	Passed 56–43	Died in committee	—	Failed
California	55	2005–06	AB 2948[88]	Passed 48–30	Passed 23–14	Vetoed	Failed
		2007–08	SB 37[42]	Passed 45–30	Passed 21–16	Vetoed	Failed
		2011–12	AB 459[105]	Passed 52–15	Passed 23–15	Signed	Law
Colorado	9	2006	SB 06-223[158]	Indefinitely postponed	Passed 20–15	—	Failed
		2007	SB 07-046[90]	Indefinitely postponed	Passed 19–15	—	Failed
		2009	HB 09-1299[159]	Passed 34–29	Not voted	—	Failed
		2019	SB 19-042[160]	Passed 34–29	Passed 19–16	Signed	Law
Connecticut	7	2009	HB 6437[161]	Passed 76–69	Not voted	—	Failed
		2018	HB 5421[162]	Passed 77–73	Passed 21–14	Signed	Law
District of Columbia	3	2009–10	B18-0769[163]	Passed 11–0		Signed	Law
Delaware	3	2009–10	HB 198[164]	Passed 23–11	Not voted	—	Failed
		2011–12	HB 55[165]	Passed 21–19	Died in committee	—	Failed
Hawaii	4	2007	SB 1956[94]	Passed 35–12	Passed 19–4	Vetoed	Failed
				Override not voted	Overrode 20–5
		2008	HB 3013[166]	Passed 36–9	Died in committee	—	Failed
			SB 2898[100]	Passed 39–8	Passed 20–4	Vetoed	Law
				Overrode 36–3	Overrode 20–4	Overridden
Illinois	21	2007–08	HB 858[167]	Passed 65–50	Died in committee	—	Failed
			HB 1685[91]	Passed 64–50	Passed 37–22	Signed	Law
Louisiana	8	2012	HB 1095[168]	Failed 29–64	—	—	Failed
Maine	4	2007–08	LD 1744[169]	Indefinitely postponed	Passed 18–17	—	Failed
		2013–14	LD 511[170]	Failed 60–85	Failed 17–17	—	Failed
		2017–18	LD 156[171]	Failed 66–73	Failed 14–21	—	Failed
Maryland	10	2007	HB 148[172]	Passed 85–54	Passed 29–17	Signed	Law
			SB 634[173]	Passed 84–54	Passed 29–17
Massachusetts	12	2007–08	H 4952[174]	Passed 116–37	Passed	—[175]	Failed
				Enacted	Enactment not voted
		2009–10	H 4156[176]	Passed 114–35	Passed 28–10	Signed	Law
				Enacted 116–34	Enacted 28–9
Michigan	17	2007–08	HB 6610[177]	Passed 65–36	Died in committee	—	Failed
Minnesota	10	2013–14	HF 799[178]	Failed 62–71	—	—	Failed
Montana	3	2007	SB 290[179]	—	Failed 20–30	—	Failed
Nevada	5	2009	AB 413[180]	Passed 27–14	Died in committee	—	Failed
		2019	AB 186[181]	Passed 23–17	Passed 12–8	Vetoed	Failed
New Hampshire	4	2017–18	HB 447[182]	Failed 132–234	—	—	Failed
New Jersey	15	2006–07	A 4225[92]	Passed 43–32	Passed 22–13	Signed	Law
New Mexico	5	2009	HB 383[183]	Passed 41–27	Died in committee	—	Failed
		2017	SB 42[184]	Died in committee	Passed 26–16	—	Failed
		2019	HB 55[185]	Passed 41–27	Passed 25–16	Signed	Law
New York	31	2009–10	S02286[186]	Not voted	Passed	—	Failed
	29	2011–12	S04208[187]	Not voted	Passed	—	Failed
		2013–14	A04422[188]	Passed 100–40	Died in committee	—	Failed
			S03149[189]	Passed 102–33	Passed 57–4	Signed	Law
North Carolina	15	2007–08	S954[93]	Died in committee	Passed 30–18	—	Failed
North Dakota	3	2007	HB 1336[190]	Failed 31–60	—	—	Failed
Oklahoma	7	2013–14	SB 906[191]	Died in committee	Passed 28–18	—	Failed
Oregon	7	2009	HB 2588[192]	Passed 39–19	Died in committee	—	Failed
		2013	HB 3077[193]	Passed 38–21	Died in committee	—	Failed
		2015	HB 3475[194]	Passed 37–21	Died in committee	—	Failed
		2017	HB 2927[195]	Passed 34–23	Died in committee	—	Failed
		2019	SB 870[196]	Passed 37–22	Passed 17–12	Signed	Law
Rhode Island	4	2008	H 7707[197][198]	Passed 36–34	Passed	Vetoed	Failed
			S 2112[197][199]	Passed 34–28	Passed	Vetoed	Failed
		2009	H 5569[200][201]	Failed 28–45	—	—	Failed
			S 161[200]	Died in committee	Passed	—	Failed
		2011	S 164[202]	Died in committee	Passed	—	Failed
		2013	H 5575[203][204]	Passed 41–31	Passed 32–5	Signed	Law
			S 346[203][205]	Passed 48–21	Passed 32–4
Vermont	3	2007–08	S 270[206]	Passed 77–35	Passed 22–6	Vetoed	Failed
		2009–10	S 34[207]	Died in committee	Passed 15–10	—	Failed
		2011–12	S 31[208]	Passed 85–44	Passed 20–10	Signed	Law
Washington	11	2007–08	SB 5628[209]	Died in committee	Passed 30–18	—	Failed
		2009–10	SB 5599[210]	Passed 52–42	Passed 28–21	Signed	Law