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The Electoral College: A Literature Review
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The Electoral College: A Literature Review
An iconic representation of the American democratic system is the Electoral College. The Electoral College has served as a go-between for voters and presidential candidates in the United States ever since the first election. We take a look at the factors that have influenced Electoral College regulations at the state level and the reasons why opinions on the subject have become so divisive. "An apportionment method that partially offsets this bias might be advantageous because the Electoral College has built-in biases that favor small states" (West 2020). Due to the fact that the US consists of a mix of relatively small and large states, the Electoral College acts as a check on the more consequential factors. When it comes to the Electoral College, it's important to remember that different states have varied statutes regarding how electors can vote. While some states' electors are obligated to cast ballots based on the popular vote, others are not. Gaines and Jenkins have already made the point that the Electoral College is biased in favor of smaller states. The Institutional tradition is the ancestor of the Electoral College's norms and its functions. An all-encompassing blanket of fairness and malapportionment sets forth the basis of the electoral college system.
A systematic view of unhappiness is created when electors are forced to adhere to the popular votes, due to biases favoring smaller states and not having all the states as a collective. This perspective on the voting system, held by both supporters and detractors of the system, originates from the school of thought known as ideas. Citizens feel an emotional and mental impact from the electoral college. They point fingers at the electoral college when one side loses and celebrate it when the other side wins.For the most part, people have been unhappy with the system from its inception because of the wrong choice phenomenon, which states that the presidential candidate who receives the most votes in the popular vote might not really be elected
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(2023). This article will trace the Electoral College's historical development, examine the legislation that governs electors, and analyze the impact of these statutes on public opinion. Also discussed in the paper will be the most recent findings regarding the Electoral College and its impact on the modern system of electing presidents.
Review of Literature
Understanding the Electoral College
Instead of electing a president by public vote, a nation's leaders are chosen by the Electoral College. This national-level method adds complexity to the presidential election with 538 electors from the 50 states and the DC (Yunus 2020). But within the larger context of the Electoral College, every state uses its own system. The winner-take-all model, in which the candidate receiving the plurality of the popular vote in a state is entitled to the full electoral reward, is a popular approach that many states have embraced. In many states, the winner-take-
all principle is the prevailing electoral legislation, making it so that getting the most votes in a particular state is a make-or-break deal.
The winner-take-all method, as its name suggests, eliminates the chance of a runner-up receiving any electoral votes at all, thus highlighting the winner's complete victory inside a specific state (Kikuchuki 2022). Not all states' electoral laws require electors to cast ballots that match the popular vote's majority, but some do. At this time, 29 states have such mandatory laws in place, guaranteeing that the Electoral College votes are representative of the general public's views. But in the other twenty-one states, voters are given some leeway to cast ballots according to their own preferences, rather than being bound by the will of the people. This gives voters more agency and flexibility in the voting process.
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The complex dance of democracy in American politics is exemplified by the ever-
changing interaction between federal principles and state-level variances. As a uniting and diverse institution, the Electoral College exemplifies the need for a representational and responsive federal government while also respecting the independence of the individual states (Schultz 2021). As the years go by, the Electoral College remains a defining part of American politics, sparking constant discussions about and introspection into the concept of electoral representation.
Fair Representation
To ensure that the president's election fairly reflects the will of the people, legislation was passed and the Electoral College was refined. For the United States presidential election to be fair and competitive, equitable representation is necessary, as it is in line with the institutional school of thinking. A modest degree of disproportionality favoring small states at the expense of large states is inherited by the Electoral College due to the fact that the Senate is not divided by population (Xu et al., 2019). From the perspective of the opposition, this means that there is more room for disagreement about the electoral college, since smaller states may end up with an unfair number of votes. A other school of thought, the ideas school of thought, could be represented here due to the bias. There is a psychological impact of the presidential election result, as stated in the opening. In his new article, Shugart laments that although the US may have been an early adopter of the popular presidential election, it has lagged behind other developed nations in terms of the procedures used to hold such elections. Diamond 2021. The goal of requiring electoral votes to match the popular vote was to ensure a fair election, however this policy has backfired. Because it demonstrates that an election can be won apart from the
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public vote, Shugart informs us of this. An over-represented group and a polarized perception of the university have been laid out in this way.
The idea that imposing electoral votes can harm a real election is inferred, even though it is not said so in the literature. Meanwhile, it maintains that larger states experience vote crowd control due to the overrepresentation of smaller states. Also, the plurality trend approach isn't working either. Additionally, the decision criteria are moving away from the plurality technique, which is susceptible to so-called spoilers (Holiday & Pacuit 2021). What he means by "spoiler" is a candidate whose very existence influences the results of other contenders even though they have little chance of actually winning. Consequently, the declining trend of the winner-take-all option demonstrates that the Electoral College's divisive viewpoint will persist regardless of any one solution.
Legal Challenges and Electoral College Decisions
A number of lawsuits and landmark court rulings have characterized the Electoral College's legal landscape, shaping its operation and raising constitutional problems. The Supreme Court has played a pivotal role in settling Electoral College-related controversies. In the very contentious 2000 presidential election in Florida, the Supreme Court stepped in to oversee the recount process in Bush v. Gore (2000) (Fortier 2020). There was a lot of back and forth on the judiciary's involvement in elections and the effects on democracy that followed the decision to end the recount and officially declare George W. Bush the winner.
Furthermore, the matter of "faithless electors" has also entered the realm of law. Legal challenges have arisen in cases when electors have voted differently than promised, raising concerns about the independence of electors and the validity of state statutes mandating that they
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reflect the will of the people. Cases like Chiafalo v. Washington (2020) have established that states can control the election process inside their borders by penalizing disloyal electors (Whittington 2019). These court challenges show how complicated the Electoral College is and how hard it is to find a way to make its workings conform to democratic ideals and constitutional standards.
Representing the United States Public
According to Warshaw (2019), voters will have a better chance of having a meaningful impact on national elections if there are more electoral plurality units. This is because smaller units will have smaller populations. In a roundabout sense, the author was trying to say that it's good for states to have an equal number of electors relative to their population. Different states have different legislation regarding the electoral college, and the author explains why this is the case.
What the author said in the text is enforced by the laws that tie electors to the popular vote. From an interpretive standpoint, it is clear that the winner-take-all technique would be rendered useless in the absence of certain state legislation. In turn, any elector could be disloyal and cast a ballot that goes against the will of the state. The interest school of thinking places a premium on an unfaithful elector. Since this is based on rational choice theory and state electors are constrained, it stands to reason that they would cast their ballots in accordance with the will of the states they represent. It would still be in line with the interest school of thinking even if no electoral laws managed to secure that state. Electors will naturally cast their ballots in accordance with the wishes of their constituents, regardless of their personal opinions.
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According to Warshaw (2019), there have been numerous efforts to change the Constitution such that presidential electors are elected by districts. He holds that district voting makes the presidential election more fair. In the event that an effort to alter said constitution were to take place, it may mediate between the two extremes on the plurality method and the electoral college, according to the Journal. Previous readings have established that the plurality method does not necessarily provide a solution, particularly in light of the public's pessimistic outlook on it. At present, members of each political party are initially selected to serve as electors. The American people will next choose an elector from among those candidates on election day using their ballots. According to Ifedi (2023), the United States uses a generic ticket system for elections, which means that no political party can have a split. Thus, the electors are chosen by the American people, regardless of their party affiliation, regardless of whether they line up along the ballot. The claim that the electors were first selected by their respective political parties was initially made. That is the point Spering was making when he says that district voting would make it more likely that an elector would share a citizen's views. With a district voting system, instead of having an organization choose electors at random from a pool of candidates, voters can select the precise candidate they wish to support.
Critiques of the Electoral College System
The United States' Electoral College system has been under fire for a long time, with many people pointing out its problems and questioning whether it can coexist with the ideals of a contemporary democratic nation. A common argument is that the Electoral College could make the "one-person, one-vote" policy less effective (Shaw 2021). Most states use a winner-take-all system, which critics say distorts the will of the people since it gives all of the electoral votes to the candidate who gets the most votes in a state without considering the preferences of
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individuals who voted for other candidates. People are questioning the system's fairness and representation because of this disparity, which has allowed certain candidates to become president even if they did not win the popular vote nationally.
The disproportionate impact of so-called "swing states" on the Electoral College process is another point of contention. Many candidates focus an excessive amount of their campaign resources on these states since they are seen as crucial in deciding the election. An uneven distribution of political influence can result from this dynamic, which can cause voters in non-
swing states to have their concerns and interests marginalized. These criticisms add to the ongoing conversation about possible changes to the Electoral College and the basic principles that should govern voting systems in a democratic nation, as long as questions regarding its effectiveness and fairness remain.
Conclusion
There will be both predictable and unpredictable factors in the Electoral College. Justice and injustice are structured differently in the US. The smaller states will have a say, which is fair, but the larger states will get more than their fair share, which is unfair. Every American should have a larger say in the presidential election process since the US has more important issues. However, smaller states will have no say in the matter if representation is eliminated. Having representation is a middle-of-the-road solution that will help all states because the picture distributes electors evenly among them according to their size and political ideology.
The distribution of electors among the states is also demonstrated, which explains the establishment of rules regarding disloyal electors. Additionally, the literature examined in this research all conform to a universal set of election laws regarding the casting of electors. That all electors in a given state cast identical ballots is precisely what that means. Electors are chosen by
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the political parties, who then cast their ballots for the general public on election day. No federal law or amendments compel electors to vote according to the popular vote, although some states do bound them to do so. What Spering set out to prove would be proven if the Electoral College were to undergo another alteration.
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Reference
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