The Electoral College: An Ineffective Method of Selecting a President The Electoral College has been a topic of debate in the United States for quite some time, forming a fissure between citizens, especially being fomented given recent and imminent elections (list 6, 11, 15). There have been elections where the winner of the Electoral College did not win the popular vote: 1824, 1876, 1888, 2000, and most recently 2016 (pattern 10). While rare, this can be significant, with the winning candidate losing popular vote margins by as high as 3,000,000 votes, a situation that is often recondite and redoubtable to the average American (list 8, 21). These situations raise concerns (pattern 20). Regarding the efficacy of the system, if the president …show more content…
One major argument is that “the elimination of the Electoral College would destroy the two-party system” effectively “destroying the cohesiveness of the nation” which is not true (McCollester). Rather, the two-party system has had a negative effect on the country, “ideas outside the mainstream may have a difficult time being heard” as third parties are minimized in favor of two major parties (Hartvigsen). Maintaining the Electoral College to preserve the two-party system is pointless; a greater variety of candidates could improve elections and better represent voters (pattern 1). Others have argued that the Electoral College is a sacrosanct tradition that is endemic to the country and the paradigm of voting systems; however, traditions can change (pattern 1a, list 4, 12, 14). However, many scholars and savants censure and deride the system because of its age, claiming that it “was obsolete within a bare decade of its inauguration” and has been outgrown by the country (Rakove, list 8, 13). The Electoral College was created by the founding fathers, founders who have nothing in common with us today and did not experience the same social milieu having digressed from that of their time (pattern 9, 12, 21). While many Americans likely blanch at the possibility of altering tradition and are tenacious toward change, we have no obligation to maintain this system, and keeping it on this basis is a banal, hackneyed excuse (list 6, 8, 9,
There are many proposed plans to run the government and decide the next president. Ideas including the District Plan, the Proportional Plan, the Direct Popular Election, the National Bonus Plan, and the National Popular Vote plan are in mind to fix the current system yet none have been decided. Currently, the president is decided by a method known as the Electoral College; however, this method has many disadvantages. In the United States today, the government runs a system known as the Electoral College.
The United States has benefited from the Electoral College for hundreds of years. This essay will discuss the presidential voting process and the merits of the Electoral College. The Electoral College is a more effective method of choosing the president than the general election. This is due to the fact that it greatly improves efficiency and ensures the integrity of the election. There would be a huge number of candidates to pick from if the Electoral College did not exist and we had a public vote instead.
Did you know that in two out of the last five U.S. presidential elections, the candidate who won the popular vote did not win the presidency? Now, to explore the question, Should We Abolish the Electoral College? The very system that defies the will of the majority. This question is often being thought about as the Electoral College has what some may argue advantages and perks, but it does have its downsides and what some may argue flaws. We will be exploring on why the current Electoral College should be left alone, as it does not allow the majority to always get their way, it ensures that all parts of a country is involved in the election and that candidates will serve the entire country, and lastly, the Electoral College creates a compromise between popular vote and congressional choice.
The US’s Electoral College has always been a controversial topic. When it was written into the Constitution, it was meant as a compromise between the small and large states, and between Congress and the states (M. West). Since then, the Electoral College system has been how the United States elected its presidents. However, it continues to face criticism and many want the system to change, favoring systems such as a national popular vote instead (National Conference of State Legislatures). Despite how the US’s Electoral College effectively balances power between the states and the federal government, it is still a deeply flawed voting system due to it being based on unrealistic expectations and outdated ideals that should be changed to reflect
Between news sources, multi-media outlets, and social media, Americans are able to educate themselves and form their own personal opinions concerning politics. When the Electoral College was created, in the late 1700’s, those that were permitted to vote received little knowledge about who they were actually voting for, so it only seemed plausible to have the well-educated people of the nation make the final decision. This idea had protected the U.S. from the risk of leaving the power of choosing who the President is in the hands of ill informed voters of the 1700’s. But now it is the 21st century, and this concept has become outdated to the U.S.’s
Furthermore, from a chart created from various sources in the years 1980 and 1992, Document B shows Electoral votes gave 0% of voting under every independent party but the votes with the most votes were republicans and democrats. This chart supports my thesis because it shows the Electoral system is not making all teams equal. Favoring democrats and republicans and giving independent teams no chance over their biased opinion proving that their system of theirs doesn't show equally in the voting. In conclusion, this information written supports my argument that the system of the Electoral College is contradicting the idea of
Due to the past election there has been several protests and opposing opinions thrown from both the Democratic and Republican parties. One particular article, “Why We Should Abolish the Electoral College”, suggests the idea that our society should abolish the electoral college, due to it’s “unequal distributed [voting power] across our nation”, and switch to the popular vote, when voting during a presidential election. At first this idea may seem sensible to those who do not understand how the electoral college works, the demand is in fact, senseless and will only lead to unproportioned voting amongst all states. However, it is easy to understand why this article is depicting that the electoral college needs adjustments, and to view the main
In a twenty-first century environment, the Electoral College is unfair. Caroline Jenkins makes this case against the Electoral College: In testimony before Congress in 1997, the League of Women Voters pointed out that apart from the public outcry that would be caused by circumvention of the popular will, there are a number of other serious flaws in the Electoral College system. The Electoral College system is fundamentally unfair to voters. In a nation where voting rights are grounded in the one-person, one-vote principle, the Electoral College is a hopeless anachronism.
If we somehow happened to be a capable vote, then we ought to have the capacity to really pick who might be president. The Electoral College removes that from us. The Electoral College is not by any stretch of the imagination reasonable for our rights and our opportunity. It, for the most part, takes away the ability to vote the president. The Electoral College was made in a period when votes were harder to gather and number.
This mechanism is usually considered to be controversial because of its impact on the presidential elections. Even though the Electoral College is a very frequent target of criticism, there are many people who still support it. The fact that the arguments presented by both sides are from different perspectives and contradictory makes it very difficult to reach any form of an acceptable consensus. One of the main arguments used by the supporters to prove the importance of the Electoral College is stressing its long tradition in connection with its role in the federal system.
However, our Founding Fathers did not intended a pure democracy, being a pure democracy is not universally good, due to it leads to tyranny of the majority and rejects compromise which could damage the union. Thus, the electoral college has proven to be operating effectively for more than 200 years, due to our Founding Fathers created an efficacious, carefully designed election system through vigorous debate and deliberation. Altogether, the electoral college should be preserved, due to it
The president of the United States is of utmost importance to the nation’s progress and success, both domestically and internationally. Hence, it follows that presidential elections are quite a popular event on a national level. Since the nation’s creation in 1776, it was clear that the president must be chosen wisely as well as fairly in order to preserve a democratic character in the United States and also to ensure an incapable president is note elected by the people. The solution that followed in response to these considerations was the establishment of the Electoral College, a method of indirect election of the president and his or her running mate for the vice presidency. The Electoral College establishes a group of electors who pledge to vote for the candidate of a specific political party.
In 1787, years after the founding of the United States, the Constitutional Convention met to decide how the new nation would govern itself. The delegates understood that the need for a leader was necessary but still bitterly remembered how Britain abused of its power. The delegates agreed that the President and Vice President should be chosen informally and not based on the direct popular vote, thus gave birth to the Electoral College. The Electoral College is defined as “a body of people representing the states of the US, who formally cast votes for the election of the president and vice president.” Since 1787 the Electoral College has been the system for voting in the United States, but with our nation ever more changing and growing it
Generations to come, ponder the ideology of: Should the Electoral College continue to hold the power of electing the President of the United States? The process of appointing electors varies by state, but generally, political parties nominate electors at their state conventions. Each state is allocated electoral votes equal to its total number of representatives in Congress. The Electoral College provides each state with a certain number of electors based on its representation in Congress, which combines the proportional representation of the House of Representatives with the equal representation of the Senate; Aiming to prevent the dominance of more populous states over smaller ones. The Electoral College is an effective form of campaigning for the next president as it’s consistent, balances regional interests, and it preserves federalism.
Several years after the United States came to be, the Constitutional Convention met to determine how the new nation should govern itself. The delegates saw that it was crucial to have a president and vice president, but the delegates did not want these offices to reflect how the colonies were treated under the British rule. The delegates believed that the president’s power should be limited, and that he should be chosen through the system known as the Electoral College. The Electoral College is a body of people who represent the states of the US, who formally cast votes for the electing of the president and vice president. Many citizens feel that the Electoral College goes against our nation’s principle of representative democracy, while others