A New Voting System: The Electoral College

First off, what is the Electoral College? The Electoral College is the process put in place by our Founding Fathers in which America votes for its President and Vice President every four years. The Electoral College was put in place to help prevent abuse of power and corruption by having a separation of government. The Electoral College is made up of representatives from each state based on how many Senate and House of Representative delegates that state has. These numbers range from 3 to 54 with the total number of electors being 538. This system has taken much scrutiny over time. According to Lenz and Holman, “The Electoral College may be the least-known and most misunderstood government institution in the American political system.”

The Electoral College gained its origins when our countries fore fathers gathered at the Constitutional Convention of 1787 and began brainstorming on different methods to elect a President. The Electoral College at the time was created to be a

(National Constitution Center) So they came up with the electoral college.The first system they used by George Washington they electors were able to vote twice for the President and Vice- President, they were able to use this for both of his 2 terms, but the system was started to crumble so they need to fix the few problem that it had. The politicians then decided to fix it to where each elector was only able to cast one vote for the President and Vice

According to fairvote.org there are many great proposals for a new system of electing the President. Direct election with instant runoff voting allows voters to pick and choose their favorite candidates rather than choosing only one candidate. Then when the votes are counted the candidate with the most votes gets elected, but if that is not the case the candidate with the lowest number of votes becomes eliminated and you simply repeat the process until a candidate receives a majority of votes. Another avenue is to proportionate the allocation of electoral votes. This system would split each states electoral votes to match each candidates popular vote percentages. For example, this method would give a candidate with 30 percent of the popular vote to receive 30 percent of the electoral votes from that state instead of zero. On the other hand, this method has its downfall because we would not know how to allocate electors proportionally. Many believe such problem can be resolved by increasing the number of electoral votes to the number needed in order to reduce margin of error while others suggest rounding to whole votes. In the end an elector cannot represent multiple candidates and in the end mistakes are a high probability of making a mistake and essentially every vote will not count equally. A direct vote with plurality rule would abolish the Electoral College, but in order for this system to work it must be combined with the instant runoff proposal otherwise it would only compliment one-half. Additionally, the congressional district method is intended to divide the electoral votes by district giving each district one vote and placing the other two votes toward the statewide popular vote winner. In essence thought this system would not fix the disproportional aspects about the Electoral College because it simply uses districts to identify each elector and people would become discouraged as most

The Electoral College is one of those things that differentiate the American electoral process from the rest of the world. It is an old institution that has been fundamental to the American political system ever since the Declaration of Independence. There have been calls to disband this way of voting to join the rest of the world with the ordinary populace voting. During the month of November in a presidential election year, every state holds an election in which all citizens who qualify may participate. They cast a ticket for president and his vice president. After this voting, the winning party is allowed to choose a slate of

They meet several weeks after the November elections in their respective state or the District of Columbia and cast their votes. They vote for the candidate with the most of the popular vote and that candidate usually wins. The Electoral College has simply sanctioned the popular vote. However, when the race is close as in 2000, the Electoral College may end up choosing the candidate who did not receive the popular vote. In the 2000 elections, Al Gore had over 500,000 more popular votes than George Bush, but lost the Electoral College 271 to 261 (pg. 186, Government by the People) In the past, some electors were supposed to have voted for the candidate with the popular vote and did not. These are some reasons so many seek and propose to reform the Electoral College.

The Electoral College was established by our nation’s founding fathers. It was recognized in the Constitution as an agreement between the vote in Congress for the election of President and the popular vote for the election of President. This election system created representative democracy instead of having direct democracy. The Electoral College began in a time when the federal government did not have the power they have today. The idea

A democracy is not democratic if the people feel as though their opinions do not matter. The existing Electoral College system oppresses the people by making them believe their votes do not count. A democratic government should not allow the popular vote in a presidential election to be overshadowed by electoral votes. For example, some larger states with more electoral votes tend to side with either the Republican or Democratic party; therefore, if republicans who live within a heavily democratic state, such as Massachusetts or California, then they feel their votes are irrelevant. In recent elections, the voter turnout hovered around 60% (FairVote, www.fairvote.org). Specifically in this past 2016 election, 131,375,500 voters out of an eligible 218,959,000 completed their civic duty and utilized their ability to vote (Voting Turnout Statistics, Statistic Brain, www.statisticbrain.com). The fact that eligible voters do not feel obliged to use the right so graciously given to them by those who fought for their right to vote proves that there is a flaw in the system. This flaw is the winner-take-all clause. A state that is almost fifty-fifty in the popular vote with one party pulling ahead should not award every single electoral vote to that one candidate. This system allows for a nation to be divided, and only one side to heavily prevail. A proposed solution to

Electoral college, was the system that had set up the Second Continental Congress to be able to care of the problem of the uneducated and uninformed voters. Each of the states were to select representatives to vote for the president. With the great deal of people in this day in age people are not aware of the events or candidates. Electoral college was set up to be able to represent the people with educated votes, so that they may elect the right

The Electoral College was established in 1788 by Article II of the US Constitution revised by the Twelfth Amendment (ratified June 15, 1804), the Fourteenth Amendment (ratified July 1868), and the Twenty-Third Amendment (ratified Mar. 29, 1961) (tumblr.com). Electoral college made up of 538 electors each state is allowed one elector for each Representative and Senator (Washington DC) is allowed 3 Electors a group of electors is chosen by each political party each presidential candidate has their own unique slate of potential Electors. Political parties chose the electors for the slate these people are chosen to recognize their service and dedication to that political party. When voters cast their vote on election day they are voting to select their state’s Electors.

Formally documented in the constitution the Electoral College is the body that elects the president and vice president elect of the United states. Each state has as many electors in the Electoral college as its representation in the house and senate. When US citizens vote, they are actually voting for the slate of electors vowing to cast their ballots for the ticket in the Electoral College. The history of the electoral college dates back to the Constitutional convention of 1787. The Convention took place in Philadelphia to discuss the concerns of the weak central government that existed under the articles of confederation. Furthermore, at the convention many methods of electing the president was put in consideration, by congress, governors,

Although this is true, the wide selection of canidates would also allow the American people to have a better selection of canidates. Instead of selecting two canidates which the electoral college promotes, they can choose from a lot more, selecting a canidate which they can identify with, and supports the issues they also support. The popular vote system presents a flawless way of electing a president, with absolutely not threat of electing a minority president. It is the best voting system for the United States and should be instated in place of the outdated electoral college.

The Electoral College is a system that was created by our Founders, men such as George Washington and James Madison. The system happens in two parts, the people vote, then the states get their turn.

The Electoral College is the current system for electing the next president and the process is as follows: a direct popular vote is conducted in each state – each of which has a fixed amount of Electoral votes based on the population of the state – and then the winner is determined by a simple majority of Electoral

The contemporary Electoral College goes a little something like this: Each state receives a number of electoral votes based on their number of US Representatives and US Senators. (states with large numbers of electoral votes receive greater attention, but each state gets at least two electoral votes). The state parties select their slate of electors. Aside from Maine and Nebraska, each state has a winner take all system. Electors vote as a block on the candidate that received the most votes – whether it is 50.1% or 95% of the popular vote. The candidate who has 270 electoral votes in the end wins the president