highest percentage of the popular vote were still elected president because they received enough votes from the Electoral College. For example, in the presidential election of 1824, John Quincy Adams was elected president with 108,740 popular votes, even though Andrew Jackson received 153,544 votes (Bailey, Kennedy, and Cohen A28). Such a system does not accurately reflect the wishes of the citizens in this democratic nation. Another flaw in the Electoral College system is the unequal distribution of electoral votes among states. The current system gives each state a number of electors equal to its number of United States senators (2), plus one for each of its United States Representatives (Federal Election Commission). This favors small states, which receive at least three electoral votes. In 1996, California, for example, received 54 electoral votes for its total population of 29,760,021 people, which is one vote per every .0000018 person (National Archives and Records Administration). Alaska, however, with its total population of 550,043, in that same year received three electoral votes, one per every .0000054 person (National Archives and Records Administration). Therefore, the vote of someone from a large state is worth less than the vote of a person from a smaller state (Citizens for True Democracy).Lastly, the Electoral College negatively affects voting legitimacy by favoring the two main political parties, while ignoring third party candidates. The winner-takes-all system of the Electoral College greatly harms third parties. In the 1992 presidential race, third party candidate Ross Perot won approximately twelve percent of the popular vote, yet did not a receive a single electoral vote (Citizens for True Democracy). The Electoral College affects third party candidates indirectly as well. Because of repeated failures, few people vote for a third party candidate because they know that person does not have a good chance o...
