Nicolas Hamlin, in his letter of April 9 (“National popular vote system is election tampering“) seems to think there is something “devious” about the person with the most number of votes actually winning an election. Huh? Does he really not understand the concept of one person, one vote? And that each vote counts equally, no matter the location?

Of course a city with a higher population gets more votes than a small town, or even a small state maybe. But that’s how it should be. Neither states or cities vote. Only individual people do. Wherever the most people are, that is where the most votes will come from. State or city lines mean nothing to the total. Every person everywhere in the country has an equal say. No exceptions.

Hamlin seems to think there’s something wrong with this. He is worried about a city allowing “non-Americans to vote.” Who are these non-Americans? Our election security in this country is very strong. People who cannot legally vote do not vote. If an immigrant has qualified to vote legally, they have the full right of the vote. We no longer allow some people to have only 3/5 of a vote.

So why would he be concerned about cities vs. the state of Maine? We are all people, we are all equal. And we each should have equal power to elect our president. Most of us are descendants of immigrants.

Nancy O’Hagan
Portland