- It was invented because the Founding Fathers didn’t want the popular vote to have ‘tyranny of a majority’ for whoever was elected could be too powerful because they had an massive majority.
What
is The Electoral College:
- The institution established by the FF to indirectly elect the POTUS and VPOTUS. Electors cast their votes in the state capitals.
How
Does It Work:
- Each states get a number of votes based on the representation that state has in Congress – so 2 electors per state because each state has 2 Senate members and the rest come from the HOR.
- Generally to win the presidency, you must get 270 electoral college votes.
- The popular vote is counted and whichever candidate wins in that state, the electors will generally vote for them – this is however a convention
- The representatives never meet, they meet a few weeks after the general election and cast their votes to the incumbent VPOTUS, then he announces it to a panel. In 2000, Al Gore announced that he had been defeated.
What
Happens If There Is A Tie:
- A tie is generally announced when the electoral college votes are tied at 269-269.
- POTUS is elected by the HOR with the more electoral college votes, the winner must get a an absolute majority of 26/50
- VPOTUS is elected by the Senate with most EC votes, winner must get a 51/100 majority
Strengths &
Weaknesses Of The Electoral College:
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Strengths:
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Weaknesses:
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Preserves The Voice Of The
Smaller Populated States: Some believe that if there was no EC
than those inhabitants votes would become useless.
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Small States Are
Over-Represented: Some thing this is also a weakness so California
has 1 EC vote per 713,000 people whilst Wyoming has 1 EC vote for
every 195,000
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Tends To Promote A
Two-Horse Race: The POTUS is a national symbol, so they should
receive more than 50% of the popular vote. In the last 7 election,
only three POTUS have won with more than half of the votes.
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Winner-Takes-All Distorts
The Result: In 1996 Bill Clinton won 49% of the popular vote but
over 70% of the EC votes. There has been an increase in candidates
losing the popular vote but winning the EC vote.
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Unfair To 3rd
Parties: In 1992, Ross Perot won 18.9 of the popular but no EC
votes. 3rd
candidates do better just in one region
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Rogue Electors: An elector
who casts their vote for someone other than the one who won the
popular vote in that state. 7/13 elections since 1968 have seen
this happen. This happened more in 2016.
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POTUS & VPOTUS Of
Different Parties: At the beginning parties did not matter as much
as they do today but in 2000 the HOR could have chosen a
Republican POTUS whilst Senate chose a Democrat VPOTUS. Known as
‘EC deadlock’
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