South Ogden
801-605-3104
The Constitution of the United States requires the use of electors in choosing the nation's president. Electors are representatives of a political party; when an individual voter casts a vote for a presidential candidate, his vote is counted as one vote for that candidate's party. The party that receives enough votes gets to send its representatives to serve as electors in the presidential election. This second election, known as the electoral college, is a provision put in place by the Founding Fathers for four reasons:
The reasons that were in the minds of the Founding Fathers when they created this system, and how it applies today, are explained here.
1. States will favour themselves. When an individual voter chooses a candidate for president, he seeks one that will attend to matters that concern himself, his family, friends, and home. That is natural. Likewise, a person who runs for and gains political office is likely to focus his work on matters that concern his family and home, because these are the things that inspire good persons to run for office, desiring to hold a position in which they can do more about them. The Founding Fathers knew this was the nature of people in selecting their leaders. While there is nothing wrong with this, the office of president of the United States does not serve one state alone, but fifty. In the beginning, political parties put up several candidates at a time to run for president, rather than one president-and-vice president pair as they do today. In every state, someone might be running for the same party. The natural tendency for voters and candidates alike would be to choose the candidate that resided in their own state, because that would be the candidate most concerned with their homes and interests. This would be a problem, the Founding Fathers saw, when some states had so many more voters than others. Although today each party only puts up one candidate pair to run, voters will still lean toward the one who, if not from his own state, yet favours his state or states like his own. In a republic where the people elect the president, each person must be counted, so population matters. More populous states have more voters, and so have more say in a nationwide vote. In a straight democracy-style vote, one that is decided by a candidate garnering more votes than any other candidate, what we call a popular vote, the most populous state would decide the vote, and states would always choose their own candidates. That meant that Maine would always choose the candidate from Maine, New York the guy from New York, Maryland the man from Maryland, and so forth, every presidential election would come out exactly the same, with the most populous state winning. One state would choose the president every time.
To prevent this, the Founding Fathers created the elector system that would indeed represent the number of individual voters by assigning electors according to population, just as the House of Representatives is filled, But those electors would prevent a state from favouring itself by not allowing a state's electors to vote only for a candidate from their own state. An elector must cast two votes, and one of them must be for a candidate that is not from the elector's own state. This way, an elector for California may cast a vote for a candidate from California, but he must also cast a vote for someone that is not from California, giving an outsider a chance as well. This creates a pool of secondary choices which, because it's a nationwide vote, is filled with votes from every state, giving an equal chance to all candidates to gain a vote from every elector. Hence, the most populous state still casts the most votes, but its electors are casting just as many for an outsider as they are for their own guy. The most populous state no longer decides the president; rather the man who gets the most electoral votes from the whole nation wins.
A straight popular vote for president cannot accomplish this without infringing on voters' rights. To do the same in a popular vote, a voter would have to be forced to cast one vote for someone outside his own state, surrendering his right to vote for whomever he really wants. A voter also has guaranteed privacy in the secret ballot system. To see that he voted for someone other than his state's candidate, every man would have to be unfailingly honest and obedient when told to do so, or else his ballot must be made public. Imagine going to the voting booth and having a police officer standing beside you, watching over your shoulder to ensure you voted for someone not from your state. No, the Founding Fathers wanted to protect the voter's right to vote however he pleases, but had to see that the natural tendencies of the voter didn't cause one state and one state only to choose the nation's president. So, the electors were put in place instead of a straight popular vote.
2. The vote for the nation's head office must be informed. Electors are people, too, and as individual citizens they get to cast a vote freely like everyone else in the popular vote for president. Then, with the results of that vote, they step into their position as electors and vote again, this time not as they please but as representatives of their political parties. In this office, they can be subject to intelligence assessment, character references demanded, investigation of possible criminal history, and qualification requirements that an individual voter is free from. A retarded adult, an autistic person, a mentally challenged individual, an illiterate person, a person who has served jail time - all may vote for the president in the United States, because voting is a right of every citizen, not a privilege that one must qualify for by demonstrating competence as for a driver's license. However, serving as an elector is not a right. One must prove competent, that he understands his responsibility and that he is fully informed about how many candidates are running and who they are. This is what the Founding Fathers meant when they said they feared the individual voter was not "educated" enough to vote alone. They were not speaking of schooling; they were referring to the voter's freedom to vote in complete ignorance if he wants to. You and I are not required to keep up with the news and politics in order to gain the right to vote; we can vote without doing any research, without knowing all the names of the candidates. An elector, because he votes on behalf of the people of his state, cannot do so. He must be "educated, (meaning fully informed)". This way, all the options are known before the choice is made. Otherwise, the choice for president cast by electors could end up being a coin-toss or an accident! The electoral system therefore ensures that the final vote is informed while protecting the rights of the individual voter.
3. Another job of the electoral college is to see that the leader of the nation is well backed by the people he leads. In a popular vote, a candidate wins by gaining more votes than any other. For example, in a classroom of ten persons, three are running for class president. Candidate A gains three votes, candidate B gains three votes, and candidate C gains four. Candidate C wins. The trouble with this is that more than half of the class doesn't want him. When he then attempts to lead the class in the pledge of allegiance, can't you just picture six of the ten people standing silent with pouting faces, refusing to take part or follow him? Just so, a person that a huge portion of the country's population hates is not in a sturdy position to lead the nation. He will meet significant opposition instead of cooperation, making his position less effective. It is not possible for the nation to be strong if it has a weak leader. He must be well supported. The electoral college has a measure built into it to ensure that the president will be in a strong position. It is this: in the electoral vote, a candidate cannot win by simply gaining the most votes. In the popular vote, yes, he may, or rather his party may; then the voting moves on to the electoral college, and here a candidate must receive more than half of all electoral votes to win. In that same classroom example, none of the three candidates gained more than half of the votes. If that occurs in the electoral college, the top three candidates' names are turned over to the duly elected members of Congress. The electors have done their job, and have no more part in it. Congress is made up of representatives of the people, and they choose the winning candidate in the same way they choose what laws to support - by voting based on what they each represent. On a lower level, like the initial popular vote, this would result in the one-state- decides problem because they favour their own, but once the vote has been through the electoral college, the field of candidates has been narrowed down under the fairer system, and the partiality of Congressmen cannot undo it or include candidates that did not "make the cut" through the electoral system. The failure of any candidate to gain more than half the electoral vote is an unusual occurrence, anyway, but the Founding Fathers saw to providing balance under any circumstance. The electoral system in this way ensures that the leader of the United States will be a well supported office.
4. The Founding Fathers were not only eager to protect the individual voter's rights, but to retain power in the individual states, instead of sinking too much into the federal government. Their Constitution, therefore, declares that each state holds the right to decide how to use its assigned electors.
The state of Maine chooses to represent closely its individual voters by using a district method. The state is divided into two districts. When the voters cast their votes for the presidential candidate of their choice, each district counts up its votes separately first. The winner in each district is awarded that district's electoral vote. After the district vote counting, all the votes are tallied together to determine a statewide winner, and the State's remaining two electors go to that winner. So, theoretically, if voters in one half of the state want one candidate, and voters in the other half want another, neither half's vote is cancelled - both candidates can be represented by the state's electors, with the one who gained the most total votes getting the two statewide electors. This split-vote scenario has never yet happened, however.
California, on the other hand, is one of many states that currently uses the "winner takes all" method, which is simply a statewide vote that allows just one winner. Under this method, if 49% of the voters want one candidate, and 51% want another, the 49% is cancelled out, and all electors are given to the candidate who gained 51% of the statewide vote. This method was at first rare, but over time several states one by one decided to employ it. The decision to use this or any other method is made by the state legislature; it is not a part of the Constitution's electoral directives.
Utah uses this system, too, but employs a unique addition to its rules. Remember that electors are representatives of a political party, and that when a voter casts a vote for a candidate, his vote is counted as one for that party's representatives to serve as electors for his state. In most states, electors are not actually required to vote for their own party's candidate. It is expected they will, and they generally do, but only in Utah does state law require them to do so to more definitely represent the people's choice.
Other methods, too, old and new, are always being proposed and discussed. Because so much is left up to the states in the application of the electoral system, the states are empowered to do as they believe will best serve the interests of their own voters. The electoral college gives power to the states. If citizens feel their individual votes are not being fairly represented by their state's method of choice, they can petition their state legislatures to change the state's election codes.
If all states were forced to use the same system against their wishes, it would take power from the states and give more power to the federal government to decide what is best for all. States differ too much for that to be fair: some have vast sections of scarcely inhabited land, while others are densely crowded, so that representing their voters may be better achieved by different voting methods. This was the case in the days of the Founding Fathers when only thirteen young states existed, and it is still the case today. State legislatures are made up of residents of their state elected by their fellow citizens, and have a better understanding of their state's situation on this front that it is possible for the federal government to have. Besides which, the Founding Fathers were careful in taking a long time to negotiate the terms of the Constitution to maintain a republic rather than a straight democracy; any power taken from the states is power given to the federal government. To balance the needs of a republic and protect the rights of states, the electoral system with the states individually deciding how to use it was the answer.
The electoral college is an indispensible system in the free American republic.
It sees that all the states, rather than the most populous one alone, have a voice in choosing the president.
It ensures that the vote is informed, while protecting the individual voter's right to vote privately and freely. Because of this system, every citizen can vote and the nation's choice for president will not end up a coin-toss or an accident resulting from incompetence or ignorance.
It keeps the office of the president on solid, well supported ground from which to lead the nation, making him an effective leader.
It protects the rights of the states by permitting them to decide how to apply the electoral system under their own state election codes.
Those who oppose the electoral system will invariably find that the problems they see are, upon close examination, actually the result of their own state legislature's method of applying the state's assigned electors, not a result of the national Constitution's electoral system.
The Founding Fathers who authored the United States Constitution and the electoral system therein for choosing the nation's president knew what they were doing. Their foresight was remarkable, and changes in population, technology, political parties, and any number of other things that have continued to shape the country over time have never yet altered the basic nature of man and the principles of freedom on which individual rights are based; and because it is in those basic principles that the electoral system is rooted, it has yet to become expendable.
A straight, democracy-style vote, one that would choose a candidate by nationwide popular vote, is fraught with problems, and strips down the rights of the free voter.
It was the individual voter whom the Founding Fathers sought to protect. It is the free voter who must now protect himself by clinging to the provisions they made to protect him, and to ensure the sanctity of the republic, through the electoral system of the United States.
An essay by Fife Yohann Tschudy
S. Ogden, Utah
Editor's Note: See "The Evolution and Destruction of the Original Electoral College" for a description of the intent of and genius of the Electoral College.
