An independent elector?

Richie Robb, mayor of South Charleston, West Virginia, is one of that state's five Republican electors. He has provoked the hostility of the GOP leadership by announcing his intention to carry out the duties of that office as dictated by the Constitution, rather than party loyalty.

"It's not likely that I would vote for Kerry," Mayor Robb told the September 8 Charleston Daily Mail. "But I'm looking at what my options are when it comes time to cast my vote." Robb has expressed strenuous disapproval of the administration's foreign policy, and aspects of its domestic policies as well. "I know that among some in my own party, what I'm discussing would be considered treasonous," Robb observes. "But I'm not going to cheerlead us down the primrose path when I know we're being led in the wrong direction.

Fellow GOP elector Rob Capeheart sees it differently. "We have a duty and a responsibility to cast our electoral votes behind the president if he wins West Virginia," insists Capeheart. "Because that's what the Republican Party expected when they chose us." With the election expected to be a tightly contested affair, the "defection" of a single elector could have a dramatic impact. "Will Richie Robb decide who the next president is?" asks Capeheart. "It's more important for us to maintain an allegiance for the people of West Virginia than an allegiance to our own personal viewpoint."

Actually, an elector's first duty is to the Constitution, as he is given wisdom to interpret that duty. West Virginia is among the 24 states that impose no legal requirements binding electors to specific candidates, thus preserving the Constitution's original intent. In the past, electors have cast independent votes, most recently in the closely fought 2000 election, when an elector from the District of Columbia withheld her vote to protest D.C.'s lack of statehood.