The Electoral College

In many school districts and private schools across the country United States history is not adequately covered, although there is some general exposure to the format and design of the U.S. government.  I am surprised when i hear a young person unaware that our country (The United States of America) is not a raw democracy, is it a democratic republic, or a republican form of democracy.  A republic, by definition, is a representative form of government where the people elect other people to represent them (i.e. no monarch (king), no dictator, no military junta, no anarchy, no tribalism).  In a raw democracy the majority vote would dictate everything and the minority would suffer.  But in a representative form of democracy there are more checks and balances that help protect individual rights and rights of minority interests.

The U.S. Constitution requires:

Article II

Section 1. The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America. He shall hold his Office during the Term of four Years, and, together with the Vice President, chosen for the same Term, be elected, as follows: Each State shall appoint, in such manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a number of Electors, equal to the whole number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or person holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United States, shall be appointed an Elector.


Twelfth Amendment

The Electors shall meet in their respective states, and vote by ballot for President and Vice-President, one of whom, at least, shall not be an inhabitant of the same state with themselves; they shall name in their ballots the person voted for as President, and in distinct ballots the person voted for as Vice-President, and they shall make distinct lists of all persons voted for as President, and of all persons voted for as Vice-President, and of the number of votes for each, which lists they shall sign and certify, and transmit sealed to the seat of the government of the United States, directed to the President of the Senate; The President of the Senate shall, in the presence of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the certificates and the votes shall then be counted;--The person having the greatest number of votes for President, shall be the President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of Electors appointed; and if no person have such majority, then from the persons having the highest numbers not exceeding three on the list of those voted for as President, the House of Representatives shall choose immediately, by ballot, the President. But in choosing the President, the votes shall be taken by states, the representation from each state having one vote; a quorum for this purpose shall consist of a member or members from two-thirds of the states, and a majority of all the states shall be necessary to a choice.... The person having the greatest number of votes as Vice-President, shall be the Vice-President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of Electors appointed, and if no person have a majority, then from the two highest numbers on the list, the Senate shall choose the Vice-President; a quorum for the purpose shall consist of two-thirds of the whole number of Senators, and a majority of the whole number shall be necessary to a choice. But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President to the United States.

Our founding fathers created a constitutional republic, not a raw democracy. A raw democracy could lead to the irresponsible rule by a majority interest. The brilliant electoral college system allows all states and areas of the country to be fairly represented and not allow a heavily populated city or one large state with selfish interests to dominate and decide the election. In essence the electoral college prevents "regionalism" where a candidate could just win a super-majority of votes in a region of the country that could carry them to the Oval Office.

In 2016, Hillary Clinton obtained 65.8 million votes while Donald Trump obtained 63.0 million votes. However, Mr. Trump won 30 states and over 300 electoral college votes, a resounding victory in terms of presidential elections. But note that the genius of the electoral college worked. In California, Mrs. Clinton won 8.75 million votes and Mr. Trump 4.48 million, a difference of 4.27 million, much more than the margin of popular vote difference overall. Remove California, and Mr. Trump won the popular vote among the 49 states by 1.4 million voters. And within California, the entire state margin of victory could be claimed by just four counties (with 4 big cities): Alameda: 418,000 more for Clinton, Santa Clara: 367,000, San Francisco: 308,000, and Los Angeles: 1.69 million extra for Clinton, for a total of 2.8 million votes more than trump in just 4 counties in one state, the margin of Mrs. Clinton's popular vote victory. The electoral college prevented California Democrats (leftists) from unfairly overwhelmingly influencing the selection of the president. The United States of America is supposed to be conglomeration of 50 semi-autonomous states, but instead over the last 2 centuries the central federal government has become more powerful while the states have been weakened. This trend must stop and be reversed, otherwise states will simply be provinces to a statist form of government where quasi socialist and communist policies can be pursued and instituted. The electoral college helps keep the selection of a temporary national executive branch leader in the hands of quasi independent states as each state makes a selection based on a statewide popular vote, and honors that selection with its electors. So each state casts a vote and the votes are tallied to determine the president, although states' voting power is proportional to its population. You have to win a majority of the states to win a presidential election, not the majority of the overall popular vote. And that is the way it should be for a 50-state democracy.

The founding fathers, the delegates to the constitutional convention in 1787, considered a popular vote for President but then rejected the proposal because they recognized the inherent unfairness that would occur in a system that is supposed to consist of semi-independent states. The electoral college decentralizes the process, forcing candidates to campaign to most states and not ignore them. The electoral college also minimizes the impact of fraud in one state from impacting the election and requiring recounts. Fraud in one state might not change the outcome in that particular state if it maintains the constitutional requirement of a winner take all elector representation (e.g. when fraud was identified in Florida in 2000, it did not change the outcome of that state's awarding of its electors to President Bush because the final tally within the state was still in favor of President Bush). If the state by state electoral college system were abolished, fraud would have a direct consequence (no longer minimized or contained by an elector system) and trust in the overall result would be changed to suspicion and distrust among states when they no longer trust the vote counts from some other states.

In 1876 Rutherford Hayes defeated Samuel Tilden, even though Tilden won the popular vote, Hayes won the electoral college. In 1888 Grover Cleveland lost the electoral college but won the popular vote because of "southern" regionalism (super-majorities in the south). In 1892 Grover Cleveland won both the popular vote and the electoral college because he campaigned for his policies in the coasts and the north in addition to the south. In 1992 Bill Clinton won the electoral college even though he only obtained 43% of the popular vote (strong 3rd party candidate that year).

The Electoral College, as Trent England stated for National Review's Imprimis journal: "continues to push parties and presidential candidates to build broad coalitions."

In summary, the benefits of the Electoral College include: (1) forcing candidates and political parties to build broad coalitions across the entire country and across all states, (2) minimizing the impact of fraudulent voting in any one state, (3) encouraging moderate tones and policies and minimizing extremist positions that would bitterly divide populations by alienating large groups of people, and (4) preventing smaller states from being ignored by national politics and policies.