I’ve read all the arguments and I admit I must still be missing something. Why do we not go with a straightforward popular vote for the American presidency? I’m convinced that it would be the simplest and best approach and would eliminate a lot of the issues such as the 2000 Florida debacle.
So - those who feel the Electoral College is neccessary for a fair election, what’s the argument?
Any particular part of electoral rules tends to favor either the Democrats or Republicans. Whoever stands to lose politically on any given change isn’t likely to vote for it, and as the D/R split is fairly even those who would benefit immediately from it don’t have enough power. Plus there’s the inertial resistance to change.
On the other hand, it’s is pretty embarassing having such an antiquated system that means such a large number of presidential votes effectively aren’t counted.
It’s a dumb system, but there is a lot of inertia. Bush didn’t even win the first time, and there was no impetus to change it.
Without the electoral college, all the campaigning would happen in high-population states - California, Texas, Florida, New York, Ohio, a few others. You would NEVER see a presidential candidate in Colorado, for instance. Who cares what they think? How many raw votes can you get out of Colorado? As it stands, given the way elections have been going, 3 electoral votes is worth fighting for.
The point of the electoral college is that the federal government is supposed to be representative of BOTH the people AND the state governments. This is part of setting up the state governments as a counterbalance to the power of the federal government. So the state governments have a say in electing the president, by introducing the electoral college which distributes power among states more evenly than a direct population distribution would be. It is also why the Senate was designed to be chosen directly by the state legislatures - the Senate was the states’ brake on federal government run rampant.
Of course, the idea of states’ rights suffered a huge defeat in the civil war , and the Progressives - thinking as you do - “what’s the point of federalism? direct democracy is always good!” - did more damage by changing how the Senate is chosen. States now have far less direct power in Washington, which results in things like unfunded federal mandates for education and safety and police paperwork and firearms regulations and so on and so forth, that the states then have to dig around in their budgets to find ways to pay for.
The federal government these days is doing all sorts of things that would be far better left to a more local level.
Sorry, but pandering to low-population states is not my idea of good government. Their votes should be worth the same as anyone else’s.
Why?
not really. how many presidential candidates visited those 3 electoral vote states? almost 0 i would think. (if not actually zero)
Because all men are created equal, endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights.
It is a form of discrimination. If it is alright for their votes to count less based on the simple criteria that they live in a particular state, why are things like color and gender verbotem?
If discrimination for voting based upon color is wrong, why is geography right?
Mmm. Naked populism. As if the Republic doesn’t have enough problems already.
I love the quote from the Founders…while ignoring that those same men also devised the system in the first place. For a reason.
Rollory- Is that any better than the system we have now where you never campaign in a state that you have won or lost? Right now, the “Florida and Ohio pick the President” system results in a tremendous amount of the campaigning being done in a handful of battleground states.
No, they’re not.
As a matter of fact, George Edwards tabulated visits by the presidential candidates in 2000, and found that only one of the seven states with 3 electoral votes got a visit: Delaware. Of the 17 smallest states in the US, only 6 got visited.
It turns out that the advantage gained by small states due having an extra elector or two is outweighed by the winner-take-all system used to assign electors in all the large states. The only way for the small states to realize their potential would be for large states to voluntarily switch to a Maine/Nebraska style system, in which a divided slate is sent to the college. Not gonna happen.
Models of voting power (the probability that your state is tied, times the probability that your state’s electoral votes are necessary for the candidate to win) put the following states on top: California, Texas, New York, Florida, Pennsylvania, and Illinois - which should come as no surprise to any election watchers.
That’s more visits than they’d get under a direct election system.
The only way for the small states to realize their potential would be for large states to voluntarily switch to a Maine/Nebraska style system, in which a divided slate is sent to the college.
That wouldn’t realize their potential, it would do exactly the opposite. In a state with voters split 60/40 between the two parties (not uncommon), you end up with a net gain of 20% of the votes. 20% of “very little” is “even less”. If 3 electoral votes isn’t worth going for, 20% or 30% of that electoral weight is even less worth it.
Do you have some specific reason for saying that, or did you just not think about it at all?
Models of voting power (the probability that your state is tied, times the probability that your state’s electoral votes are necessary for the candidate to win) put the following states on top: California, Texas, New York, Florida, Pennsylvania, and Illinois - which should come as no surprise to any election watchers.
Of course it is not a surprise. The point is the degree of importance - the electoral college is supposed to make them less overwhelmingly predominant.
That wouldn’t realize their potential, it would do exactly the opposite. In a state with voters split 60/40 between the two parties (not uncommon), you end up with a net gain of 20% of the votes. 20% of “very little” is “even less”. If 3 electoral votes isn’t worth going for, 20% or 30% of that electoral weight is even less worth it.
Do you have some specific reason for saying that, or did you just not think about it at all?[/quote]
before the “you didn’t think about it at all” accusations start flying, perhaps you should re-read the part where he says, “The only way for the small states to realize their potential would be for large states to voluntarily switch to a Maine/Nebraska style system, in which a divided slate is sent to the college.”
Come on, Russel. If people had to read posts before jumping straight into “I HATE YOU AND YOU’RE DUMB AND WORTHLESS BECAUSE WE HAVE DIFFERENT IDEAS ABOUT POLITICS” mode, this wouldn’t be the P&R we all vaguely tolerate.
I’m with you liberals… anything the founding fathers set up was friggin stupid.
Electoral college, screw that!
Property rights? Blah!
to be honest, i wanted to add a samuel l jackson “english motherf–ker, do you read it?!” jpg, but i decided it would be too much effort to find or make one.
In the age of 24-hour news channels and the Internet, is it really necessary for a candidate to visit a state anyway? And honestly, when a candidate does show up for a speech in some small town, how many people show up? A few hundred? But millions see that same speech on television…so what’s the point of actually visiting somewhere?
I just can’t imagine this:
“Well, I disagree with 99% of the positions of Candidate A, but he came to my town and shook my hand, so I’m going to vote for him.”
I think the problem with the electoral college can be summed up in 2 words: Florida recount. Without an electoral college, Florida wouldn’t have decided who won the 2000 presidential election.
Oh, and what about the senate?
Do you dislike the estate tax? Because the founding fathers set that up to blunt entrenched aristocracies.
Wouldn’t an abolition of the electoral college effectively just get rid of all state borders for purposes of the election?
I mean then a vote in Cincinatti would be as good as a vote in Wyoming right?