What Are The Pros And Cons Of Electoral College

Every four years, on the first Tuesday in November, millions of American citizens go to the polls and vote indirectly for their President. However, the actual election takes place in December and only 538 people are involved and this small group is called the Electoral College. This paper will explain and analyze the voting process of the US president, mainly focusing on the Electoral College. The US Constitution was forged 200 hundred years ago in which the “founding father” divided the process of electing the President and Vice President in two-step systems; by which people will cast their votes, then these votes will convene to a small group, Electoral College.

The Electoral College is made up of 538 electors who vote to decide the President and Vice-President of the United States. When voters go to the polls, they will choose which candidate receives their state's electors. The candidate who receives a majority of electoral votes (270) wins. The number 538 is the total of the nation's 435 Representatives, 100 Senators, and three electors given to the District of Columbia.

The Electoral College had an interesting part in the election of 1824. By this time, the Federalist Party was no longer, which meant the United States was being dominated by the Democratic-Republicans, who led the one party system. There were four candidates running for President in the election of 1824. These candidates were Andrew Jackson, Henry Clay, William Crawford and John Quincy Adams. Andrew Jackson was the winner according to the Electoral College, with ninety-nine votes.

The Electoral College is a system where each state is given a number of electoral votes determined by the number of the representatives in the state combined with two electoral votes for the number of senators, and three electoral votes from the District of Columbia, totalling five hundred and thirty eight votes. The people then vote for their candidate as president and the winning presidential candidate in that state wins the electoral vote for that

Despite the waning support for amending the constitution to alter the way American’s cast their ballots, throughout each election cycle media outlets discuss the fear surrounding the minority candidate, in terms of the popular vote, becoming the President. In an interesting article published by Forbes magazine just before the 2012 elections Taylor Broderick discusses the fifteenth, nineteenth, and twenty-sixth amendments and explains how these create a precedent for altering the U.S. voting system through amending the Constitution (Brodarick, 2012). He also argues that the Electoral College incites voter apathy in states which are not saturated with campaign efforts. In other words, people are more likely to participate in an election if they live in swing-states where candidates are actively campaigning. For these reasons, along with American’s historical opposition, Broderick believes politicians should gain public support for Congressional action, as Bayh did in the late 1960s, to throw out the current voting procedure.

Contrary to popular belief, when it comes to voting for president, the United States runs on an indirect democracy. This means that we do not directly choose our president; the electoral college is rather an example of federalism, both the Feds and the States are involved in the process. It is a collection of 538 votes that determine who the President will be: 100 senators, 2 per state, and 438 representatives, distributed by the population. These 538 votes in the Electoral College are divided among the states. Each state, no matter how populous or not, starts off with three votes.

The Electoral College is a compromise reached on September 4, 1787 at the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (Henry). The President of the United States is not chosen based on the popular vote by the people, rather through a process called the Electoral College. Early in our nation’s history, how a President would be elected was still in question. The founding fathers were intent on devising a legitimate system of election for the people by the people.

The Electoral College is established in Article Two of the U.S. Constitution, it states that “Electors shall meet in their respective states, and vote by ballot for two persons. The person having the highest number of votes shall be the President, if such number be a majority of the whole numbers of electors appointed”(Hardaway 79). The twelfth amendment modifies this procedure to require balloting for president and vice president be done separately. Although there were sixty-nine electors who participated in the first election, we now have a total of five hundred and thirty-eight. To win the presidency, a candidate must receive two hundred and seventy votes.

No other nation has so ornamental a manner of determining their leader in this circumstance, as president of the United States. The framers petrified that a presidential plebiscite and—with reminiscences of how the Roman republic deteriorated into an kingdom—dreaded that the people together with a president who controlled the armed forces might imperil liberty and constitutional government. Their distress of mobocracy led them to cast-off popular election of the president (Genovese “Electoral College”). Unlike the electoral process for members of Congress or governors, citizens do not directly elect the president of the United States. Instead, the president is chosen by a group of 538 electors that comprise the Electoral College.

1)First of all, I have learned that Electoral College was established in the U.S Constitution (Article II, Section 1) to find a compromise between election of the President by a vote in Congress and popular vote. It was created to give an extra power to small states. Madison thought that Electoral College would be the better that popular voting because of the prevalence of slavery in the South. In my opinion it had more sense back days than today.

The United States of America has a rich history filled with success, failure, courage, and drive. Millions have come seeking the “American Dream” and to live in the land of the free. The past is what has shaped this nation’s present and future. Yet, as time drifts, the world around us changes. What was once deemed acceptable can now seem outdated in today’s society.