Argumentative Essay: Should The Electoral College Be Preserved?

Div Dasani

Mrs. Stauffer

AP Lang- 4

17 October 2014

Government

Should the Electoral College be preserved? Four presidential elections in the United States have resulted in a candidate winning the presidential elections without actually managing to acquire a plurality of the popular vote. Normally this is not justifiable in any democracy; however it has happened numerous times in America due to the Electoral College. The Electoral College violates the democratic principles it seeks to maintain and should not be preserved. In the United States, the Electoral College is a collection of people who represent each individual state, who cast votes to elect the president and vice president. This body is currently comprised of 538 people;

According to Source D, All states are guaranteed at least 3 votes in the Electoral College, regardless of size, and only after this is populace considered. This disproportionate distribution radically skews the power in the favor of small states. Low population states like Wyoming for example, have one congressional representative for every 200,000 people, while states with high populations, such as Texas, have only one congressional member for every 670,000 people. Furthermore, consider the case of the all-or-nothing allocation issue. In this method of election, a state gives all of its votes to the candidate who garners the largest plurality of the popular vote in that state, regardless of the proximity of the difference in popular vote. For example, a candidate would reap all 21 votes from Illinois, regardless of whether the competitor won 51% of the popular vote or 99% of it (Source B). This system is impractical and unjust as it nullifies the voice of the populace voting for the minority candidate in that state, which allows for almost half the people of a state not having a say during an

According to Source G, when the Electoral College was first created by our founding fathers, the average voter had little opportunity to learn about presidential candidates or their policies, and thus the job was given to the Electoral College. These select individuals were far better educated in the field of politics and were more capable of making an informed choice than the average citizen. In modern times however, with an educated population and mass media, voters can learn about candidates themselves and thus be trusted to choose their president. Furthermore, in the early years of the nation, travel to the Washington D.C. could take as long as two weeks, and new policies or events that were revealed during this time could alter a voter’s decision on his preferred candidate. Thus it was necessary for a body of representatives to make decisions on the behalf of the people they represented in real time. In today’s age however, with data carried through fiber optic cables adept at transmitting information in mere seconds, the general public is capable of making decisions on policies as they are being presented regardless of their location, making the middlemen representatives that embody the Electoral College an unnecessary violation of democratic