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The Pros And Cons Of The Electoral College

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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,

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