The Proportional Representation League was an organization founded in 1893 in the campaign for the adoption of the Proportional representation system of voting at the city, state and federal level in the U.S. (There was a separate Proportional Representation League in the United Kingdom as well.) Many Canadians as well as Americans were active in the League. The date of its demise is unknown but its newsletter, The Proportional Representation Review, apparently ceased publication in 1932. [1]
The Proportional Representation League was founded at the Memorial Art Institute of Chicago at the World's Columbian Exposition on August 10–12, 1893, to promote the cause of proportional representation within the United States. [2] [3] Its activities included distributing information to inquirers on the reform and publishing pamphlets, books and The Proportional Representation Review.
Prominent members included Rhode Island Governor Lucius F. C. Garvin, federal judge Albert Branson Maris, and economist and labor reformer John R. Commons. [4] [5] [6]
Robert Tyson, a resident of Toronto (Canada), was the editor of the PR Review from 1901 to 1913. He met with Australian Catherine Helen Spence, a pioneer of effective voting (which was her term for PR), and president of the Effective Voting League of South Australia, when she visited Canada in 1891. [7] In 1903 he conducted the election of the executive of the Trades and Labour Congress using Hare-Spence PR (Single transferable voting). Tyson authored two pamphlets that were published by the PR League -- Proportional Representation including its relationship to the Initiative and Referendum (1904) and Proportional Representation - its Principles, Practice and Progress, with description of the Swiss Free List, the Hare Spence Plan and the Gove System. [8] Clarence Gilbert Hoag became editor of the PR Review in 1914. Hoag had authored the pamphlet The Representative Council Plan of City Government, published by the PR League in 1913. [9] Hoag also was co-author (with George Hervey Hallett) of the book Proportional Representation (1926).
Here is a statement of the beliefs of the PR League.
"WHAT WE ADVOCATE" "The P. R. League urges the Hare system of proportional representation ("P. R.") for the election of representative bodies. This system of election gives every group of like-minded voters the share of the members elected that it has of the votes cast. It does this by giving every voter a single vote, either at large or in a district electing several members, and requiring a separate quota of votes for the election of each member.It allows the voter to make his vote count without knowing whether his favorite can secure the necessary quota or not. All he has to do is to mark not only his first choice but as many alternative choices as he likes. If it is found that his ballot cannot possibly help elect his first choice, it is used instead for the first of his later choices whom it can help. For a detailed description of the system, see the P. R. League's Leaflet No. 5." [10]
Proportional representation (PR) refers to any type of electoral system under which subgroups of an electorate are reflected proportionately in the elected body. The concept applies mainly to political divisions among voters. The essence of such systems is that all votes cast – or almost all votes cast – contribute to the result and are effectively used to help elect someone – not just a bare plurality or (exclusively) the majority – and that the system produces mixed, balanced representation reflecting how votes are cast.
Party-list proportional representation (list-PR) is a subset of proportional representation electoral systems in which multiple candidates are elected through their position on an electoral list. They can also be used as part of mixed-member electoral systems.
The single transferable vote (STV), sometimes known as proportional ranked choice voting (P-RCV), is a multi-winner electoral system in which each voter casts a single vote in the form of a ranked-choice ballot. Voters have the option to rank candidates, and their vote may be transferred according to alternate preferences if their preferred candidate is eliminated or elected with surplus votes, so that their vote is used to elect someone they prefer over others in the running. STV aims to approach proportional representation based on votes cast in the district where it is used, so that each vote is worth about the same as another.
Single non-transferable vote or SNTV is an electoral system used to elect multiple winners. It is a generalization of first-past-the-post, applied to multi-member districts with each voter casting just one vote. Unlike FPTP, which is a single-winner system, in SNTV multiple winners are elected, typically in electoral districts; additionally, unlike FPTP, SNTV produces mixed representation and makes it unlikely for a single party to take all the seats in a city or a set area, which can happen under FPTP.
In the study of electoral systems, the Droop quota is the minimum number of votes needed for a party or candidate to guarantee they will win at least one seat in a legislature.
The largest remainders methods are ways of allocating seats proportionally. They contrast with the more popular highest averages methods, which are generally preferred by social choice theorists.
The Electoral Reform Society (ERS) is an independent advocacy organisation in the United Kingdom which promotes electoral reform. It seeks to replace first-past-the-post voting with proportional representation, advocating the single transferable vote, and an elected upper house of Parliament. It is the world's oldest still-extant electoral reform campaign.
In the study of apportionment, the Harequota is the number of voters represented by each legislator under a system of proportional representation. In these voting systems, the quota is the number of votes that guarantees a candidate, or a party in some cases, captures a seat. The Hare quota is the total number of votes divided by the number of seats to be filled.
There are two types of elections in Andorra: parliamentary elections and local elections. The 28 members of the General Council of the Valleys are elected in parliamentary elections for a maximum term of four years. In the local elections, the council members of the seven parishes of Andorra are elected for a four-year term.
Catherine Helen Spence was a Scottish-born Australian author, teacher, journalist, politician, leading suffragist, and Georgist. Spence was also a minister of religion and social worker, and supporter of electoral proportional representation. In 1897 she became Australia's first female political candidate after standing (unsuccessfully) for the Federal Convention held in Adelaide. Called the "Greatest Australian Woman" by Miles Franklin and by the age of 80 dubbed the "Grand Old Woman of Australia", Spence was commemorated on the Australian five-dollar note issued for the Centenary of Federation of Australia.
The single transferable vote (STV) is a semi-proportional representation system that elects multiple winners. It is one of several ways of choosing winners from ballots that rank candidates by preference. Under STV, an elector's vote is initially allocated to their first-ranked candidate. Candidates are elected (winners) if their vote tally reaches quota. After this first count, if seats are still open, surplus votes—those in excess of an electoral quota—are transferred from winners to the remaining candidates (hopefuls) according to the surplus ballots' next usable back-up preference.
The Edmonton provincial electoral district also known as Edmonton City from 1905 to 1909, was a provincial electoral district in Alberta, Canada mandated to return members to the Legislative Assembly of Alberta from 1905 to 1917 and again from 1921 to 1959.
The Hagenbach-Bischoff system is a variant of the D'Hondt method, used for allocating seats in party-list proportional representation. It usually uses the Hagenbach-Bischoff quota for allocating seats, and for any seats remaining the D'Hondt method is then applied so that the first and subsequent divisors for each party list's vote total includes the number of seats that have been allocated by the quota. The system gives results identical to the D'Hondt method and it is often referred to as such in countries using the system e.g. Switzerland and Belgium. Luxembourg uses the Hagenbach-Bischoff method to allocate seats in its European Parliament elections.
Proportionality for solid coalitions (PSC) is a fairness criterion for ranked voting systems. It is an adaptation of the proportional representation criterion to voting systems in which there are no parties, the voters can vote directly for candidates, and can rank candidates in any way they want. This criterion was proposed by the British philosopher and logician Michael Dummett.
Proportional Representation Society of Australia Inc. is an electoral reform organisation in Australia. Its membership includes people that have successfully promoted electoral reform.
Semi-proportional representation characterizes multi-winner electoral systems which allow representation of minorities, but are not intended to reflect the strength of the competing political forces in close proportion to the votes they receive. Semi-proportional voting systems are generally used as a compromise between complex and expensive but more-proportional systems and simple winner-take-all systems. Examples of semi-proportional systems include the single non-transferable vote, limited voting, and parallel voting.
An electoral system or voting system is a set of rules that determine how elections and referendums are conducted and how their results are determined. Electoral systems are used in politics to elect governments, while non-political elections may take place in business, non-profit organisations and informal organisations. These rules govern all aspects of the voting process: when elections occur, who is allowed to vote, who can stand as a candidate, how ballots are marked and cast, how the ballots are counted, how votes translate into the election outcome, limits on campaign spending, and other factors that can affect the result. Political electoral systems are defined by constitutions and electoral laws, are typically conducted by election commissions, and can use multiple types of elections for different offices.
Hare-Clark is a type of single transferable vote electoral system of proportional representation used for elections in Tasmania and the Australian Capital Territory. The method for the distribution of preferences is similar to other voting systems in Australia, such as for the Australian Senate.
Indirect single transferable voting or Gove system is a version of single transferable vote (STV), where the vote transfer is determined by the candidate's instructions and not the individual voters choices. This system allows to achieve many of the benefits of STV without the complexity of implementing a ranked voting system.