m was really the logical consequence of the direct statewide vote for Electors owing to the influence of political parties. For in a direct popular election, voters loyal to one political partys candidate for president would naturally vote for that partys list of proposed Electors. By the same token, political parties would propose only as many Electors as there were electoral votes in the State so as not to fragment their support and thus permit the victory of another partys Elector. There arose, then, the custom that each political party would, in each State, offer a "slate of Electors"a list of individuals loyal to their candidate for president and equal in number to that States electoral vote. The voters of each State would then vote for each individual listed in the slate of whichever partys candidate they preferred. Yet the business of presenting separate party slates of individuals occasionally led to confusion. Some voters divided their votes between party lists because of personal loyalties to the individuals involved rather than according to their choice for president. Other voters, either out of fatigue or confusion, voted for fewer than the entire party list. The result, especially in close elections, was the occasional splitting of a States electoral vote. This happened as late as 1916 in West Virginia when seven Republican Electors and one Democrat Elector won. The Time of Choosing Electors The time for choosing Electors has undergone a similar evolution. For while the Constitution specifically gives to the Congress the power to "determine the Time of choosing the Electors", the Congress at first gave some latitude to the States. For the first fifty years of the Federation, Congress permitted the States to conduct their presidential elections (or otherwise to choose their Electors) anytime in a 34 day period before the first Wednesday of December which was the day set for the meeting of the Electors in their respective Sta...
