Data Bases • Custom Term Papers • Free Term Papers • Free Research Papers • Free Essays • Free Book Reports • Plagiarism? Links • Top 100 Term Paper Sites • Top 25 Essay Sites • Top 50 Essay Sites • Search 97,000 Papers @ DirectEssays.com • Search 101,000 Papers @ ExampleEssays.com • Search 90,000 Papers @ MegaEssays.com Free Essays • Term Paper Sites • Chuck III's Free Essays • Free College Essays • TermPaperSites.com • Free Essays • My Term Papers • Essay World • Planet Papers	Search Lots of Essays Back to Subjects - Government & Politics The Electoral College Then Now and Tomorrow The Electoral College Then Now and Tomorrow The Electoral College system has been in place for over 200 years and Americans are still not sure how it works or if it is the best system. Many Americans feel they go to the polls every year and vote for the president, and in the long run they are in control of the fate of our executive branch. With the 1992 election it was clear that many people had little understanding for how a president is chosen; the 1992 election came close to having no majority of electors due to Ross Perot and his third party. However, after this last debacle over the presidency, many people are crying "foul" even though they still understand little or nothing about the benefits of the Electoral College. We have grown into a society that no longer needs a reason…we just respond to sensationalist propaganda as if it's fact. Before any debate it was assumed the best system of electing the president was to have congress do it. However, if congress was to elect the president, then the president might feel an obligation to help congress get certain laws passed by not vetoing. This would put a dent in the checks and balances system. Even with this problem the system was voted for and approved on four different occasions (Peirce 39). Not many believed in the direct vote system, but three prominent people did; James Wilson, Gouverneur Morris, and James Madison (Peirce 41). Most delegates did not think that the American democracy had matured enough to offer a direct vote. It was still an unstable government and most drafters believed that the people were generally misinformed and easily misled (Peirce 41). Hence, this system of direct representation was voted down, but was helpful in seeing the pitfalls of the legislature deciding a president (Peirce 41). When they had seen the pitfalls of two systems, a third compromising system evolved…the electors. Winston Churchill later said, "the Electoral College system is probably the worst possible method of choosing a president--except for all the others (Glennon 3)." However, according to the sensationalist propaganda that was mentioned earlier, there are three problems to the current Electoral College system. First, a president can be elected to office even if it is not what the people want. Second, electors are not punished for being unfaithful to what they have pledged. (At least not in 26 of the states) Finally the system for electing a president if no electoral majority is reached. Recognizing the strong regional interests and loyalties which have played so great a role in American history, the Electoral College system contributes to the cohesiveness of the country be requiring a distribution of popular support to be elected president. Without such a mechanism, the president would be selected either through the domination of one populous region over the others or through the domination of large metropolitan areas over the rural ones. Indeed, it is principally because of the Electoral College that presidential nominees are inclined to select vice presidential running mates from a region other than their own. For as things stand now, no one region contains the absolute majority (270) of electoral votes required to elect a president. Thus, there is an incentive for presidential candidates to pull together coalitions of States and regions rather than to exacerbate regional differences. Such a unifying mechanism seems especially prudent in view of the severe regional problems that have typically plagued geographically large nations such as China, India, the Soviet Union, and even, in its time, the Roman Empire. This unifying mechanism does not, however, come without a small price. The price is that in very close popular elections, it is possible that the candidate who wins a slight majority of popular votes may not be the one elected president - depending (as in the most recent election) on whether his popularity is concentrated in a few States or if it is more evenly distributed across the States. (Like George. W. Bush) Yet this is less of a problem than it seems since, as a practical matter, the popular difference between the two candidates would likely be so small that either candidate could govern effectively. The practical value of requiring a distribution of popular support outweigh whatever sentimental value may attach to obtaining a bare majority of popular support. The Electoral College system is designed to work in a rational series of defaults. If, in the first instance, a candidate receives a substantial majority of the popular vote, then that candidate is virtually certain to win enough electoral votes to be elected president. In the event that the popular vote is extremely close, then the election defaults to that candidate with the best distribution of popular votes (as evidenced by obtaining the absolute majority of electoral votes). Moreover, In the event the country is so divided that no one obtains an absolute majority of electoral votes, then the choice of president defaults to the States in the U.S. House of Representatives. One way or another, the winning candidate must demonstrate both a sufficient popular support to govern as well as a sufficient distribution of that support to govern. Furthermore, far from diminishing minority interests by depressing voter participation, the Electoral College actually enhances the status of minority groups. This is so because the voters of even small minorities in a State may make the difference between winning all of that State's electoral votes or none of that State's electoral votes. And since ethnic minority groups in the United States happen to concentrate in those States with the most electoral votes, they assume an importance to presidential candidates well out of proportion to their number. The same principle applies to other special interest groups such as labor unions, farmers, environmentalists, and so forth. It is because of this "leverage effect" that the presidency, as an institution, tends to be more sensitive to ethnic minority and other special interest groups than does the Congress as an institution (Peirce 149). Changing to a direct election of the president would therefore actually damage minority interests since a national popular majority would overwhelm their votes. In addition, arguments that the Electoral College contributes to the political stability of the nation by encouraging a two party system, have intrinsic validity. There can be no doubt that the Electoral College has encouraged, and helps to maintain, a two party system in the United States. This is true simply because it is extremely difficult for a new or minor party to win enough popular votes in enough States to have a chance of winning the presidency. Even if they won enough electoral votes to force the decision into the U.S. House of Representatives, they would still have to have a majority of over half the State delegations in order to elect their candidate and in that case, they would hardly be considered a minor party. In addition to protecting the presidency from impassioned but transitory third party movements, the practical effect of the Electoral College is to virtually force third party movements into one of the two major political parties. Conversely, the major parties have every incentive to absorb minor party movements in their continual attempt to win popular majorities in the States. In this process of assimilation, third party movements are obliged to compromise their more radical views if they hope to attain any of their more generally acceptable objectives. Thus we end up with two large, pragmatic political parties which tend to the center of public opinion rather than dozens of smaller political parties catering to divergent and sometimes extremist views. In other words, such a system forces political coalitions to occur within the political parties rather than within the government. A direct popular election of the president would likely have the opposite effect. For in a direct popular election, there would be every incentive for a multitude of minor parties to form in an attempt to prevent whatever popular majority might be necessary to elect a president. The surviving candidates would thus be drawn to the regionalist or extremist views represented by these parties in hopes of winning the run-off election. The result of a direct popular election for president, then, would likely be frayed and unstable political system characterized by a multitude of political parties and by more radical changes in policies from one administration to the next. The Electoral College system, in contrast, encourages political parties to coalesce divergent interests into two sets of coherent alternatives. Such an organization of social conflict and political debate contributes to the political stability of the nation. Finally, the Electoral College maintains a federal system of government and representation. In a formal federal structure, important political powers are reserved to the component States. In the United States, for example, the House of Representatives was designed to represent the States according to the size of their population. The States are even responsible for drawing the district lines for their House seats. The Senate was designed to represent each State equally regardless of its population. And the Electoral College was designed to represent each State's choice for the presidency (with the number of each State's electoral votes being the number of its Senators plus the number of its Representatives). To abolish the Electoral College in favor of a nationwide popular election for president would strike at the very heart of the federal structure laid out in our Constitution and would lead to the nationalization of our central government - to the detriment of the States. Indeed, if we become obsessed with government by popular majority as the only consideration, should we not then abolish the Senate which represents States regardless of population? (Which would be quite ironic, being that Hilary Clinton, a steadfast opponent to the Electoral College, would lose her--oh so--"stolen" position as senator.) Should we not correct the minor distortions in the House (caused by districting and by guaranteeing each State at least one Representative) by changing it to a system of proportional representation? Of course not! The fact is, the original design of our federal system of government was thoroughly and wisely debated by the Founding Fathers. State viewpoints, they decided, are more important than political minority viewpoints. And the collective opinion of the individual State populations is more important than the opinion of the national population taken as a whole. The Electoral College has performed its function for over 200 years (and in over 50 presidential elections) by ensuring that the President of the United States has both sufficient popular support to govern and that his popular support is sufficiently distributed throughout the country to enable him to govern effectively. Although there were a few anomalies in the recent election nothing devastating has happened and the country will make it through the next four years regardless of the president. Proposals to abolish the Electoral College, though frequently put forward, have failed largely because the alternatives to it appear more problematic than is the College itself. The fact that the Electoral College was originally designed to solve one set of problems but today serves to solve an entirely different set of problems is a tribute to the genius of the Founding Fathers. Bibliography: Works Cited Berns, Walter (ed.) After the People Vote: Steps in Choosing the President. Washington: American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, 1983. "Electoral College." Congressional Digest Oct 1992: 226,256. Congressional Quarterly's Guide to U.S. Elections (2nd ed). Washington, D.C.: Congressional Quarterly, 1985. Glennon, Michael J. When No Majority Rules. Washington: Congressional Quarterly Inc, 1992. Peirce, Neal R. The People’s President. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1968. Reichley, James A., ed. Elections American Style. Washington: Brookings Institution, 1987. Schlesinger, Arthur M. Jr. (Ed.) History of Presidential Elections 1789-1968. New York: Chelsea House Publishers, 1971. Word Count: 1866
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