TITLE: Unclear on the Concept, or How Ken Griffey, Jr., is like James Monroe
AUTHOR: Eugene Wallingford
DATE: December 28, 2016  1:01 PM
DESC: 
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BODY:
 Today I read an article on
<A HREF="http://www.fairvote.org/faithless_electors">
   faithless electors</A>,
 those members of the Electoral College who over the years did
 not vote for the candidate they were pledged.  One story from
 1820 made me think of baseball's Hall of Fame!

<BLOCKQUOTE><EM>
 William Plummer, Sr. was pledged to vote for Democratic-Republican
 candidate James Monroe.  Instead, he cast his vote for John Quincy
 Adams, also of the Democratic-Republican Party, although Adams was
 not a candidate in the 1820 election.
</EM></BLOCKQUOTE>

<BLOCKQUOTE><EM>
 Supposedly, Plummer did not feel that the Electoral College should
 unanimously elect any president other than George Washington.
</EM></BLOCKQUOTE>

 There are many Hall of Fame voters each year who practice Mr.
 Plummer's ostentatious electoral purity.  They don't vote for
 anyone on his first ballot, preserving "the legacy of their
 predecessors", none of whom -- neither Cobb nor Ruth, Mays nor
 Aaron -- were elected unanimously.

 (Some leave a great off the ballot for a more admirable reason:
 to use the vote to support a player they believe deserves entry
 but who does not receive many other votes.  They hope to give
 such a player more time to attract a sufficient body of voters.
 I cut these voters a lot more slack than I cut the Plummers of
 the world.)

 It was a silly idea in the case of President Monroe, whose
 unanimous election would have done nothing to diminish
 Washington's greatness or legacy, and it's a silly idea in the
 case of baseball greats like Ken Griffey, Junior.
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