An Argument for the Electoral College

Americans do not vote for their choice of president. When casting a presidential ballot, one is voting for a slate of electors to vote for the president. In the days after the 2000 presidential election, Americans received a civics lesson in the Electoral College in action.One can see the impact of casting a vote in local or regional elections (Delahunt vs. Johnson 1996). Rarely if ever to the scale and degree in a Presidential election as was the case in 2000, where the final registered vote tally in Florida gave the state and it's electoral votes to Texas Governor George W. Bush by 537 votes out of some 10 Million votes cast. In nationwide popular vote, Vice President Albert Gore, Jr. won more than 300,000 votes more than did Governor Bush, yet the will of the majority surrendered to constitutional procedure.

There have been several commissions to study the Electoral College, none resulting in any change to the system. Two states (Maine and Nebraska) differ in their implementation of assigning electoral votes to a candidate (Glennon 1992), leading some experts to recommend a modified approach to the system. Yet, as of the date of this research, there has been no movement to change the constitution in light of the most recent presidential election.
This research paper will explore whether this somewhat obscure institution can be preserved and still play a useful role in present-day American democracy. This paper will not look at whether the Supreme Court of the United States should have intervened in the 2000 election or whether the decision in Bush v. Gore 2000 was correct, but simply the narrower question of the efficacy of the Electoral College.

History

The Electoral College was borne from compromise. Each of the thirteen states had disparate interests due to size and economy. The United States was a nation of 4 million people largely unconnected by transportation or communication. The goal was to devise a system that not only balanced the interests of the Presidency and Congress as well as the rights of states against the federal government (Kimberling 2000).

Not many believed in the direct vote system, largely because of the poor communication from outside a state or region. From this, and lessons from Roman history, came the concept of an electoral college (Kimberling, 2000).

The electoral college was revisited in 1800, largely to accommodate the reality of political parties, the idea of direct election was not reconsidered either because the country itself had not changed geographically or because of the rapid degeneration of the French Revolution where it was felt there was "too direct a democracy (Kimberling 2000)."

The process has evolved over the proceeding two hundred years, from electors being selected by state legislatures to the more modern first past the post or "winner take all" elections. Each time evolving toward a more direct election, but never toward absolute direct elections.

Scope

The Electoral College system allows us to view the Presidential election as 51 separate contests (each of the 50 states, plus the District of Columbia), with the weight of each election based on the state representation. The number of electors is the total number of Senators and Representatives in Congress; currently, that number is 538. Each state has one electoral vote for each Senator and one vote for each Representative. Therefore, each state has at least three electoral votes as each state has two Senators and at least one Representative.

In Presidential elections, the voters of a state are casting ballots for a slate of electors. In 2000, the choices were electors committed to Governor Bush, electors committed to Vice President Gore, and several other smaller party candidates including Green Party electors for Ralph Nader and Libertarian electors for Harry Browne. The winning slate of electors in a state is appointed to cast electoral votes on the first Monday after the second Wednesday in December to cast their votes for President and Vice President of the United States. (United States Constitution, Amendment 12; 3 U.S.C. § 7,8). By law, the Congress counts the votes on January 6 (3 U.S.C. § 15).

When there is not a clear winner of electoral votes (currently 270 are needed to win, which is a majority of the whole number of electors appointed (United States Constitution, Amendment 12) the election goes to the House of Representatives, which decides the President-elect. If there is no decision before January 20 of the year following the election, the sitting Vice President remains President of the Senate until resolution. (Bach, 2000)

Rationale

Why do the citizens vote for an electoral representative instead of the President directly? Why do the citizens of the United States vote for all other elections on a national level? Popular vote determines Senators and Governors, yet the Office of President of the United States is determined indirectly.All elections based on a region no larger than a state use the popular vote system. The people of Massachusetts do not vote for a Senator or Governor for California. The scope and diversity is not as large as when you compare the size of a sole state to the size of our country as a whole. In this author's opinion, it could not work fairly.
If you were to increase the size of the electorate or amend the constitution to a popular vote for the President, each American's vote becomes less and less influential. "Your vote matters less in a larger pool of votes: its the same drop in a bigger bucket and less likely to change the outcome of an election" (Hively 1996).

The Electoral system creates smaller multiple elections, where the idea is to win the most elections, where people have different views, needs and beliefs. It forces the political parties to present an election platform that appeals to a broader group of people. "A Presidential candidate worthy of office, should have broad appeal across the whole nation, and not just play strongly on a single issue to isolate blocs of voters" (Hively 1996). Otherwise, we may split into many factions of different viewpoints. Each faction would look for candidates that represent only their viewpoints. This has dangerous pretenses: As evidenced by the closeness of the 2000 election, the electorate demonstrates how divided a nation can be.

A nation without the Electoral system would be very different from what we have grown accustomed to. Candidates would not propose issues for smaller groups of people and would tend not to compromise. This adds protection from regional candidates. Suppose that one region of the country, was in despair due to a natural disaster or terrorist attack. The population in that region may be so desperate for relief that it would not matter to them if the rest of the country suffer in order to get that relief. They could override the rest of the country, just because they are a more densely populated area. They would be able to elect a candidate that is appealing only to their needs and not to the rest of the country. In a popular vote system, it would be wise for a candidate to promise to resolve the issues even if it meant compromising the rest of the country. With the Electoral system, a candidate could address that regions issues and be would not be able to do so at the expense of the rest of the country.

Of course, in the Electoral system you could end up with a President that did not receive the popular vote. This is not common and it is not clear evidence that the system is flawed. The vote counts are often very close, as in Bush vs. Gore. One individual vote carries a tremendous impact in these situations.

Hively suggests in his article Math Against Tyranny (1996) that the same logic that governs our Electoral system, also applies to many sports. For instance in baseball's World Series, the team that scores the most runs overall is like a candidate who gets the most votes.

It would seem that any one system could not be unflawed or perfect. We can only strive for that goal. Perhaps if American citizens had a more detailed discussion regarding the Electoral College, we could reduce the feeling of disenchantment.

REFERENCES

American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research. Proposals for Revisions of the Electoral College Systems. Washington, 1969.

Bach, Stanley & Maskell, Jack (2000 November, 17) Overview of Electoral College Procedure and the Role of Congress Library of Congress Congressional Research Service. Retrieved October 21, 2001, from the World Wide Web at http://freedom.house.gov/electoral/crsmemo.asp

Berns, Walter (ed.). After the People Vote: Steps in Choosing the President. Washington: American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, 1983. Bush, George W., et al., PETITIONERS v. Gore, Albert, Jr., et al., December 12, 2000.

Constitution, The Retrieved October 21, 2001, from the World Wide Web at http://freedom.house.gov/electoral/constitution.asp

Delahunt, William D. versus Johnston, Philip D. et al. 423 Mass. 731; 671 N.E. 2d 1241 Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts (1996, November 8). Retrieved from the World Wide Web at http://www.usc.edu/dept/polsci/gillman/delahuntvjohnston.html

Glennon, Michael J. When No Majority Rules: The Electoral College and Presidential Succession. Washington D.C.: Congressional Quarterly 1992.Hively, Will (November, 1996) Discover magazine Math Against Tyranny. Retrieved from the World Wide Web at http://208.245.156.153/archive/output.cfm?ID=907

Kimberling, William C. (2000). The Electoral College. Retrieved November 13, 2001, from http://freedom.house.gov/electoral/fecmemo.asp

Neale, Thomas H. (July 1999) The Electoral College: How it Works in contemporary Presidential Elections. Library of Congress Congressional Research Service. Retrieved October 21, 2001, from the World Wide Web at http://freedom.house.gov/electoral/crs-ec.asp

Neale, Thomas H. (July 1999) Election of the President and Vice President by Congress: Contingent Election. Library of Congress Congressional Research Service. Retrieved October 21, 2001, from the World Wide Web at http://freedom.house.gov/electoral/crs-ec.asp