Source:
http://www.learnnc.org/lp/media/lessons/davidwalbert7232004-02/electoralcollege.html
I. How the Electoral College works
The people of the United States elect a president every four years, but not directly. Here's how it works.
1. In November of a presidential election year, each state holds an election for president in which all
eligible citizens may vote. Citizens vote for a "ticket" of candidates that includes a candidate for
president and a candidate for vice president.
2. The outcome of the vote in each state determines a slate of electors who then, in turn, make the actual
choice of president and vice president. Each state has as many electors as it has senators and members of
the House of Representatives, for a total of 538. (The District of Columbia gets three electors even
though it has no representation in Congress.)
3. In December, the electors meet in their respective state capitols to cast their ballots for president and
vice president. States may or may not require their electors to vote with the popular majority, and they
may or may not give all of their electors to the winner of the statewide popular vote. (See "A Work in
Progress," below.)
4. These ballots are opened, counted, and certified by a joint session of Congress in January.
5. If no candidate wins a majority of the electoral votes or if the top two candidates are tied, the House of
Representatives selects a president from among the five candidates with the most votes. Each state's
delegation has a single vote. The Senate selects a vice president by the same process. (This hasn't
happened since 1876, but it almost happened in 2000.)
What does this mean in practice? It means, as everyone learned or was reminded in 2000, that the candidate
who receives the most votes nationwide does not necessarily become president. There is no national election for
president, only separate state elections. For a candidate to become president, he or she must win enough state
elections to garner a majority of electoral votes. presidential campaigns, therefore, focus on winning states, not
on winning a national majority.
It also means that — at least in theory — electors can thwart the popular will and vote for a candidate not
supported by the voters of their state. In practice, however, electors are pledged to cast their votes in accordance
with the popular vote, and "faithless electors" who go against the popular vote are extremely rare. Had there
been a faithless elector in 2000, however, Al Gore might have become president! (See the historical perspective
below for more about this.)
II. Why not a popular vote? (an historical perspective)
When we're debating whether some aspect of the Constitution makes sense, it's useful sometimes to think of the
Constitution as an experiment — as a work in progress. Some of its original framers referred to it that way, as a
Great Experiment in democracy. In 1787, no republic like the United States existed anywhere in the world. The
"founding fathers" were making things up as they went along, looking at history, philosophy, and what they did
and didn't like about existing governments in Europe and America. And not all of them agreed — in fact, many
of them disagreed completely, even on important issues such as how much power the people should have.
The Electoral College was a compromise on two important issues. The first was how much power the people
should have, and the second was how much power small and large states should have.
Power to the people?
In 1787, it wasn't at all clear whether democracy would work. In fact "democracy" was a bit of a dirty word in
some people's minds: it raised fears of mob rule, as in fact had happened in a few places during and after the
Revolution. The United States was intended as a republic, in which the people would govern themselves only
through elected representatives.
Because the role of the president was so important, most of the framers thought that the people couldn't be
trusted to elect the president directly. Instead, they should elect electors, who would convene as a "college of
electors" to consider the available candidates and pick the best man for the job.
Power to the states!
Before the Revolution, the British colonists didn't have much consciousness of being Americans. They may
have identified themselves instead with the British Empire and with their own colonies. Even after the
Revolution, loyalty to one's state often still came first. The Constitution was intended to unite the states under a
single national government — but not entirely. Small states like New Jersey feared that if they formed a union
with the other twelve states, they'd be swallowed up under the influence of more populous states like Virginia
and New York. Virginia and New York, of course, thought that they should have the most influence. That's why
the states have equal representation in the Senate but representation by population in the House of
Representatives: it's a compromise that allowed large states to get their due but still allowed small states to keep
their identities and fight for their interests.
When it came to voting for president, the framers of the Constitution decided that the states should do the
voting, not the people. Remember, there was no consciousness of the United States as a single nation; it was,
literally, a union of separate states. So voting for president was to take place by state, so that each state could
have its say. The compromise between big and small states was extended to the electoral college, so that each
state has as many electors as it has senators and members of the House of Representatives combined. Big states
still have the most influence, but small states aren't completely lost in the national vote.
A work in progress
It was up to the states to decide how they ought to vote for their electors — and to a great extent still is, in fact.
There is no national election for president, but rather fifty-one separate elections, one in each state and one in
the District of Columbia. In the beginning, state legislatures voted for electors, who in turn voted for the
president and vice president. Electors were free to vote for the candidate of their choice, but over time they were
increasingly elected because they supported a particular candidate. By 1832, every state but South Carolina held
direct elections for president, and electors were effectively bound to vote for a particular candidate. (South
Carolina held out until 1864.)
Today, of course, every state allows citizens to vote directly for electors — as represented on the ballot by the
candidates with which they are associated — but the electors are still not legally bound to vote for any
particular candidate. An elector could, in theory, throw his or her vote to any candidate! Since each candidate
has his or her own slate of electors, however, and since the electors are chosen not only for their loyalty but
because they take their responsibility seriously, this almost never happens. (It last happened in 1988, when it
had no impact on the outcome of the election.) Some states have laws requiring electors to cast their votes
according to the popular vote.
In addition, a state doesn't have to throw all of its electors behind the candidate that receives the most popular
votes in that state. Two states, Maine and Nebraska, assign one elector to the winner of each Congressional
district and the remaining two electors to the candidate with the most votes statewide. After the 2000 election,
there was some debate about whether that system would be more fair than the winner-take-all system used by
the other 48 states and the District of Columbia.
The original Constitution also didn't take into account the development of political parties. Electors were to vote
for two candidates for president. The man with the highest number of votes that was a majority became
president, and the man with the second highest number of votes became vice president. In 1800, however, the
Democratic-Republican Party nominated Thomas Jefferson for president and Aaron Burr for vice president, and
because there was no separate voting for the two offices, the two men tied in the electoral college. The House of
Representatives had to decide the issue. Afterwards, the 12th Amendment to the Constitution was passed,
changing the system to the one described in part I, above.
III. The people vs. the electors (more historical perspectives)
As everyone learned or was reminded of in the election of 2000, the Constitution doesn't say that the candidate
with the most popular support has any claim on the Presidency. It says that the candidate with the most electoral
votes will become president. So George W. Bush won the election fair and square, by the rules set forth in the
Constitution.
Actually, the last president to be elected by a majority of the voters was George H. W. Bush in 1988. In 1992
and 1996, Bill Clinton won with a plurality — more than any other candidate, but less than half of the total vote
— because there were three major candidates. Because the third candidate, H. Ross Perot, failed to win a
majority anywhere, he didn't win any electoral votes, and Clinton was able to win a majority of the electoral
votes without winning a majority of the popular vote.
George W. Bush wasn't the first candidate to become president despite losing the popular vote, either. It also
happened in 1824, 1876, and 1888, and each time, a debate ensued about whether the outcome was fair or right.
In 1824, Andrew Jackson won the most popular votes (at least in states where popular elections were
held), but no candidate won a majority of the electoral votes. The House of Representatives selected
John Quincy Adams as president. (Jackson won the election four years later.)
In 1876, Democratic candidate Samuel Tilden narrowly won the popular vote over Republican candidate
Rutherford B. Hayes, but twenty contested electoral votes prevented either man from winning a majority
of electors. In a compromise that ended the federal occupation of the South that had begun after the
Civil War, Congress certified all twenty contested votes as having been cast for Hayes.
In 1888, Republican Benjamin Harrison easily won a majority of the electoral vote despite losing the
popular vote to his opponent, Democrat Grover Cleveland. Cleveland's support was largely regional: he
won large majorities in several southern states, which raised his popular vote totals but won him few
electoral votes. Harrison won narrow majorities in most other states, however, and won the electoral
vote 233 to 168.
And in 2000, Democrat Al Gore won a narrow plurality of the popular vote but lost the electoral vote to
Republican George W. Bush, 271 to 266. The vote was so close that Gore, thinking he had lost,
conceded, then retracted his concession as more votes were counted. Because the vote in Florida, a
decisive state, was so close, multiple recounts were held, and the Supreme Court had to settle a lawsuit
over whether recounts should continue.
In the further reading section below you'll find some good articles about those elections with arguments about
whether the outcome was fair and why the electoral college should or should not be blamed.
IV. Does my vote count?
Yes, your vote counts. Some people have complained since 2000 that if the winner of the popular vote doesn't
become president, their vote doesn't really count, so why vote at all? But every vote does count; it just counts in
a more complicated way. When you vote for president, remember that you're voting in a state election, not a
national election. So your vote counts just as much as anyone else's in your state — but it may count more or
less than that of someone living in another state!
What's a vote worth?
Why does the actual weight of your vote vary by state? Remember that every state gets a number of electors
that is the total of all of its representatives in Congress, both in the House of Representatives and in the Senate.
The House of Representatives is divided approximately by population — big states have the most
representatives, small states have the fewest — but every state has exactly two senators, regardless of size. That
means that while big states have more electors than small states, they don't have as many more as they would
based on population alone.
Consider three states: California (the state with the biggest population), North Carolina (a medium-sized state),
and Alaska (with one of the smallest populations). This table shows their population and number of electoral
votes in 2000. The fourth column shows the number of residents per elector (population divided by electoral
votes), and the last column shows the weight of an individual vote in the given state — that is, how the number
of residents per elector compares to the national average.
Population Electoral votes Residents per elector Weight of vote
California 33,871,648 54 627,253 0.83
North Carolina 8,049,313 14 574,951 0.91
Alaska 626,932 3 208,977 2.50
United States 281,421,906 538 523,089 1.00
As you can see, Alaska, a very small state, has far fewer residents per electoral vote than the national average,
so individual votes cast in Alaska count more than the national average — twice as much, in fact! A voter in
California has a little less influence than the average American, about 83% as much. A voter in North Carolina
has about 91% the influence of the average American. (You can calculate weight of vote in a given state by
dividing the national average of residents per elector by that state's residents per elector. Since we're comparing
each state to the national average, the weight of vote for the entire United States is exactly 1. Don't get it? Read
more about the math.)
A paradox
While every American's vote counts, then, your vote counts more if you live in a small state like Alaska than it
does if you live in a big state like California. This seems like a paradox, because clearly a big state as a whole
has more influence than a small state. If you're running for president, you are more concerned about winning
California, with its 54 electoral votes, than you are about winning Alaska with its 3 electoral votes. As a matter
of strategy, you'd probably spend more time and money campaigning in the big states than in smaller states. As
a result, residents of big states tend to get more attention in presidential elections than residents of small states,
and so small-staters may feel left out and unimportant. Yet in reality, each individual voter has less influence in
a big state than in a small state.
But is it fair?
Ah, that's the question! It certainly doesn't seem fair that a voter in Alaska effectively has more say about who
becomes president than a voter in California. But Alaska is a perfect example of why the electoral college was
created. Because it's such a big state geographically, and because it is so far from the 48 contiguous states,
Alaska has unique interests that, many would argue, deserve representation equal to the interests of New York
or California. Other big western states with small populations, such as Montana and North Dakota, would make
similar arguments. Of course, it's hard to argue that Delaware, which had 3 electors and only 783,600 residents
in 2000 (for a weight of vote of 2.00), really has unique interests that deserve special consideration. The fairness
of the electoral system has been debated for more than 200 years, and it doesn't appear that the debate is going
to die down anytime soon.
Debating the Electoral College Name:
Directions: Using the reading provided to you in class answer the following questions.
1. Do electors have to vote with the popular majority in a state? Who determines this?
No, the state
2. What two important issues did the Electoral College compromise on?
How much power the people and states should have
3. Why was the word “democracy” considered a dirty word?
Raised fears of mob rule
4. How did the Electoral College function in the first Presidential elections? Who voted
for electors?
State legislatures
5. How does the electoral system work differently in Maine and Nebraska?
assign one elector to the winner of each Congressional district and the remaining two electors to the candidate
with the most votes statewide
6. Who was the last President to win a majority of the popular vote before the most recent election?
George H.W. bush in 1988
7. Why does the weight of a states vote differ from state to state? For example, why
does the state of California’s vote have a different weight than the state of Alaska? A higher population
gives you more electoral votes, and because of that, an individuals vote weighs more in smaller populated
states.
8. Who then has more influence, a voter in a large state or small state? Explain.
A voter in a small state. voters influence is determined by the number of residents per elector compared to the
national average.
9. Below are 5 options to consider for electing the President. Based on your knowledge of the Electoral College
and the principles we have discussed in this class, choose an option that you believe would be the best way to
elect a President. Explain your answer in significant detail!!
1. The current process (no change).
2. Direct popular election. The candidate with the most votes nationwide becomes president, and there is no voting by state.
3. Proportional voting. Each state retains its current number of electors, but within each state, electoral votes are assigned
proportionally to the popular vote. If a candidate wins 60% of the popular vote in a given state, he or she receives 60% of the
electoral vote.
4. Voting by congressional district. Each congressional district gets one electoral vote, which goes to the winner of the
popular vote in each district.
5. Compromise between state and district voting. Each congressional district gets one electoral vote, which goes to the
winner of the popular vote in each district. In addition, each state gets two electoral votes that go to the winner of the
statewide popular vote. (This is the system currently used in Maine and Nebraska. This is sometimes called the "Humphrey
Compromise.")
Write you answer here!! I believe that direct proportional voting is the best way to elect the president. I believe it also would be
hard to organize a direct popular election but it ensures that the president elected is who most of the population wants as a
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