The Importance Of 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 has been instituted since 1787 and is a group of people that elect the United State President and Vice President. The United States citizens do not directly vote for the president, but their vote is considered by electors that have pledged to vote for the winning candidate. There are 538 electors which corresponds with the 100 senators and the 435 representatives plus 3 electors for the District of Columbia. An elector is nominated or appointed by their state’s party and are usually well connected. Congressmen and high ranking U.S. officials are prohibited from being electors. In most states they follow a “Winner takes all” format, where the elector votes for the candidate who wins the popular vote. The Electoral College systems is outdated and illogical for the present and should be abolished.

Though our founding fathers created the Electoral College over 200 years ago, it has been changed with time to accommodate modern needs and is still an important and necessary part of our electoral system. The Electoral College ensures political stability in our nation by encouraging the two-party system and also protects the interests of minorities. Furthermore, the Electoral College helps maintain a united country by requiring widespread popular support of a candidate in order for him or her to become president.

In June of 1804 the states had ratified the Twelfth Amendment which enacted the Electoral College in time for the 1804 election. When election time comes, Americans vote for the President and Vice President who are chosen by Presidential electors, who as a whole are known as the Electoral College. As a decision was needed for a method of choosing candidates, the Constitutional Convention of 1787 contemplated many different ways of electing the President, but toward the end of the proposals and ideas the matter had to be taken to the Committee of Eleven on Postponed Matters which is the committee who conceived the original Electoral College. In recent years, much debate has been stirring regarding whether or not the Electoral College has a place within this country's elections. For many states this method of tallying and casting votes is great because every state receives a minimum of three electoral votes considering each state has two senators and at least one representative (Lewis). However, these minimum electoral votes make the distribution of electoral college votes uneven throughout the fifty states, making each American citizen's vote count less or much more which is cause for change. If the information on these weighted votes is analyzed it can be concluded that states with a population similar to Wyoming has one “elector” for every 177, 556 persons while Texas has one “elector” for every 715,499 persons. While the Electoral College has worked for generations, there are some negative factors that give cause to abolish this practice, such that are; faithless electors, the winner take all system, and finally, safe and swing states.

In presidential elections, citizens do not actually vote for the candidate of their choosing, instead citizens are voting for electors known as the Electoral College. The Electoral College chooses a President, and Vice President. The Constitution gives each state a number of electors that equals the number of House of Representatives and Senate, which totals five hundred and thirty eight and also includes three electors for the District of Columbia. Each state receives a certain number of electors based on population size. The results in a state determine which electors are chosen. All electoral votes in a state go to the candidate that gets the most votes, and after state elections appointed officials certify the popular vote of each state. Two hundred and seventy votes are needed to elect a President; the candidate with the majority of the votes becomes the president.

When the Constitutional Convention gathered in 1784 they had the difficult task of determining how our government should be assembled and what systems we should use to elect them. They quickly decided congress should have the powers to pass laws and the people should elect these people to ensure they are following the will of the people. But who should elect the president?

The Electoral College is made up of 538 Electors. This number is an addition of 435 Representatives, 100 Senators and 3 District of Columbia electors. Every four years, the election is reborn, and citizens across the nation begin voting for their desired candidate. In all but two states, Nebraska and Maine, the majority votes win that states electoral vote. As for those two states, the votes are determined by proportional representation. The top voter in those two states receives two votes for their Senators. The rest of the votes are allocated by congressional district. What does this do? This gives the candidates an opportunity to gain votes from these to states instead of the winner-take-all that happens in the other 48 states. Finally, the selection of the electoral college differs from state to state. The majority of Electors are nominated by political parties at their conventions. Other times, the Party’s central committee casts a vote. These electors are either state elected officials, party leaders, or people with a strong affiliation with presidential candidates (What Is the Electoral College? How It Works and Why It Matters,

“The Electoral College is made up of 538 electors who cast votes to decide the President and Vice-President of the United States” (What is the Electoral College, 2012). In order for a candidate to win they must get the majority of the electoral votes which is 270. How does the Electoral College work? Every four years when people go to the polls to vote for the new president and the vice president of the United States, in all but two states (Nebraska, and

The 2000 presidential election was a major eye opener for many people. As it appeared to also be the dismay of many, the candidate who won the most popular votes nationwide actually lost the contest. In the election's risen moment, popular attention centered around the Electoral College and its role in the presidential election. Under the U.S. Constitution, the people did not necessarily direct vote for the President in a nationwide election; rather, the people in each state would vote for electors from that state, who in turn would cast the constitutionally decisive votes for President and Vice President. Moreover, not only is the people's influence indirect, the Electoral College's voting pattern does not necessarily track the national popular

The United States has used the Electoral College as a way to elect the president for over two hundred years and it is a main reason the smaller states have a chance to voice their opinion. The Electoral College has caused great debate within the US as to whether or not it is a political anachronism. The Electoral College consists of 538 total votes which are then divided up based on the population of each state and at least 270 electoral votes are required for a president to win the election. A consensus is taken every ten years to see if the population of each state has increased or decreased therefore changing the number of electoral votes it will receive. Some people argue that if the majority of the population wants a candidate to be president then that is the best way to elect someone but that is not necessarily true.

The Electoral College is comprised of 538 votes, and the votes are split between the States Based on population. Whenever a party wins a state there is a representative handpicked by the party to be sent and vote for their party’s candidate though they are not legally obligated to do so. It is a winner take all system so whoever end up with the most electoral votes wins the presidency.

Election Day is here! America is ecstatic to have the right to vote for what they believe in. Yet there is a 20 percent voter turnout? .300 trillion people residing in the country and only a fraction a million show up? America has fought so hard to protect the rights of the people only to have not participated. The Electoral College is an important role in the election of president. The president has so many role to take on and it is 300 billion people responsible to put the right man in office. That is extremely impertinent on grounds that American will not even show up. The Electoral College is a fair and equitable way to elect the president because it will protect America from no shows, allows small state to have a voice, and because society

What is the Electoral College? The Electoral College is a system that our Founding Fathers established in the Constitution in which representatives from the 50 states elect the President of the United States. The system begins with the people electing representatives to represent them, and then the representatives meet so they can vote for the next President and Vice President. The votes from each representative are then counted by Congress and are able to elect the candidate that has the most votes. According to the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (2013), “The Electoral College consists of 538 electors…270 electoral votes is required to elect the President.” Every state has an

Electoral College is a block, or weighed, voting system that is designed to give more power to the states with more votes, but allows for small states to swing an election, as happened in 1876. Under this system, each state is assigned a specific number of votes that is proportional to its population, so that each state's power is representative of its population. So, while winning the popular vote may not ensure a candidate's victory, a candidate must gain popular support of a particular state to win the votes in that state. The goal of any candidate is to put together the right combination of states that will give him or her 270 electoral votes.

Under the current system there are five hundred and thirty eight electors. Each state gets one elector, each representative, and a senator. A presidential candidate needs two hundred and seventy votes to win the election. The electors meet after the November popular election to cast their votes and officially elect the president. Electors may vote for whomever they wish. Each state's electoral votes are awarded on a winner take all bases.