The framers of the U.S. Constitution created the Electoral College as a result of a compromise for the presidential election process. During the debate, some delegates felt that a direct popular election would lead to the election of each state's favorite son and none would emerge with sufficient popular majority to govern the country. Other delegates felt that giving Congress the power to select the president would deny the people their right to choose. After all, the people voted for their representatives to the federal legislature. The compromise was to set up an Electoral College system that allowed voters to vote for electors, who would then cast their votes for candidates, a system described in Article II, section 1 of the Constitution.
Each State is allocated a number of Electors equal to the number of its U.S. Senators (always 2) plus the number of its U.S. Representatives (which may change each decade according to the size of each State's population as determined in the Census).
Whichever party slate wins the most popular votes in the State becomes that State's Electors-so that, in effect, whichever presidential ticket gets the most popular votes in a State wins all the Electors of that State.
The debate has started again as to whether the U.S. Constitution should be amended in order to change the presidential election process. Some promote eliminating the Electoral College in favor of a direct popular vote for president while others believe the Electoral College should remain unchanged. Just as compromise solved the initial problems of the framers so it is that compromise can solve this problem. The solution is to change the electoral votes to electoral points and reward each candidate a percentage of points based on the percentage of popular votes received in each state. This would eliminate the "winner take all" system thus allowing for all the votes to count. A voter is more apt to believe their vote counted when a percentage of popular votes are taken into account rather than the "all or nothing" system currently in existence. Further, this new system would integrate the desire for a popular vote for president with the need for the individual states to determine who actually gets elected. For example, in Alabama, President Bush won 63% of the popular vote and therefore would be awarded 5.67 electoral points as compared to Senator Kerry with 37% of the popular vote and 3.33 electoral points. In the event of a tie, the national popular vote results would decide the outcome.
If one tabulated the final totals from Election 2004, they would find Bush with 274.92 electoral points versus Kerry with 257.71. The existing electoral college votes shows Bush 286 to Kerry 252. I believe this compromise would reflect a truer intent of the will of the people as exercised through their states. This would also prevent the smaller "red" and "blue" states from being virtually ignored in favor of the larger "battleground" states.
People only seem to see one side of this issue and ignore the fact that there are problems with allowing a simople direct vote. Such a system would not increase smaller states importance; rather it would only serve to further decrease their importance.
__________________
Jesus Christ--The reason for the season!
If you can read this, thank a teacher. If you can read this in English, thank a veteran.
If you're certain you know everything, there's little opportunity to learn anything.
JOEBIALEK each state dictates how their Electoral votes are given out. I believe it was Colorado that tried the percentage split on votes before the 2004 election but I do not know the outcome.
I would favor my state doing the split ie 10 electoral votes up for grabs and Bush gets 70% of the popular votes then he would recieve 7 EV's and Kerry 3 EV's
During the debate, some delegates felt that a direct popular election would lead to the election of each state's favorite son and none would emerge with sufficient popular majority to govern the country.
Actually, James Madison was the creator of the Electoral College, his words were to the effect that he knew new immigrants etc. tend to all congregate in large cities and generally are very socialistic in their voting patterns. He did not want a bunch of "new foreigners" running this country.
Given the influxes that we are currently seeing, it's a damn good thing Madison got his way or you would be vending taco's from under a bridge.
I am actually torn on Madison. He was a brilliant businessman and a shrewd politician but I can't help but think he was the primary architect of the huge overbearing federal goobermint we have today. Probably the best example of this is Federalist #10.
I"m assuming you meant the federalist papers. Generally I get my political rantings and ravings from reading hardcopies (I used to be a real political junkie but have tapered off over the years). I have the works of Karl Marx, Hitler some Lenin and a host of other books that are now gathering dust. I have 5 copies of the federalist papers and the anti-federalist papers but you can get them on the web.
Currently i have to sit my dumb azz down and read Buchanan's "where the right went wrong" -- it's been sitting on my coffee table for a month now, I just don't get into the reading mood too often anymore.
Electoral College
