The Electoral College is a system stated in the Clause 2 of Section 1 in the Article II of the United States Constitution to elect the President of the United States. According to the Constitution, each state needs to appoint electors, who in turn vote to select the President. The number of electors from each state should be the same as the number of Senators and Representatives that the state entitled in the Congress. Citizens from each state choose the electors through elections. The electors then cast the citizens’ votes for the candidate they prefer. For one to be elected as the President, the candidate needs to get the greatest number of votes. In order to evaluate whether this system is effective or not in the current situation of United States, we need to understand the goals of the setting up of the Electoral College to see if the system has served its purposes. In my opinion, I believe the Electoral College is not a good idea for the United States at the moment. The reasons will be discussed in the following passages. The Electoral College was first set up because the founders of the …show more content…
One famous example is the 2000 presidential election. Al Gore has received half a million more popular votes than George Bush at that time. Nonetheless, Gore lost the Electoral College and Bush became the President instead. To sum up, I believe the necessity of the Electoral College still exists, despite the fact that it is weakened. It is probably one of the best ways to prevent the dominance of highly populated states in the election. However, it creates issues like the election result may not truly reflect the public will, even though this does not happen very often. Reflecting the popular will is one of the important criteria for evaluating an electoral method. Therefore, I hold that the Electoral College is not effective enough at the moment and further modifications may be
Like many others great creation the Electoral College has some downfalls. The first con of the Electoral College according to Amelia Josephson " It gives too much power to swing states". What this means is when candidates run for president are more likely to target swing states rather than going to a state that always goes blue or red. Candidates do this because they are trying to sway the swing there way so they can win, which then gives the swing states power into picking the presidency. The second con the Electoral College according Kathleen McCleary
Based on the pie charts, the reader is shown that presidents that did win the popular vote, did not win by that large of a margin the Independent candidate and other major-party candidate split the votes. The Electoral College only shows a larger win ratio. Abolishing the electoral college would “...encourage single-issue ideologues and eccentric millionaires to just into presidential contests” (Document E). Although these people tend to run anyways, the electoral college is a way to ensure that the people with no political background or people that do not qualify as president will not win. The Electoral College was originally built for a world that did not have mass media and a way for people among the U.S. to communicate, but presently, the Electoral College serves as a way to ensure
On the other hand there are those who wish to abolish the Electoral College and label this action as “past its due date”. These people argue that it is no longer effective in a nation where media presents us with the information needed to make informed decisions. These critics argue that it presents unequal and unfair representation of the people and individual states by not always being representative of the popular vote and place the final vote in the hands of only a select amount of elected officials. The most significant aspect to be considered by the American people is whether or not the Electoral College is still efficient in the mass media influenced society and ever changing world we live in today in order to decide whether the system our forefathers created for us needs to update, is outdated, or a fair representation of the American
Throughout American history, there were five cases where the electoral college votes did correspond with the popular vote during the elections of: Jackson, Tilden, Cleveland, Gore, and Clinton (Doc. G). When the founders gathered together in 1787 to write the Constitution, they were worried about many topics and did not want the Constitution to fail just as the Articles of Confederation. They considered many topics and thoroughly wrote a remarkable Constitution, excluding the slavery of African Americans, they did not want the government to be too strong and also did not want the people to have too much input. They greatly questioned: Who will choose the President? Therefore, they created the electoral college that is merely based on population
The Electoral College is a system of voting created by the writers of the Constitution. The main goal of the Electoral College was to ensure that the citizens of the United States could not elect the president directly. The writers of the Constitution believed that the voters would not be properly educated on who they were voting for and consequently make a poor choice. The Electoral College is no longer in need today given that the public is adequately educated on the candidates for elections as a result of the excess amount of communication today. The Electoral College should be abolished because small states are over represented, the system is unfair to third party candidates, and a tie leads to a vote in the House of Representatives.
When you go and vote for president, do you think your vote goes toward the decision of who becomes president? If you do, think again because the system is not as clear cut as it seems. In 1787 during the Constitutional Convention, the delegates discussed a way to vote for president without having the passions of the people and average voters getting in the way. The Electoral College has 538 members total which are divided among states, with each state receiving the amount of electoral votes that corresponds with their population. The outdated system known as the Electoral College, should officially be abolished from the process of the presidential election in the United States.
There are many pros and cons to both sides of this argument. I feel that there is still a need for the Electoral College. It is not very often that a candidate loses by electoral vote. This system of voting allows each state to play the same part in the voting process. Without the Electoral College the biggest problem would be that smaller states would not stand a chance against the bigger states.
The Electoral College has been one of the most debated topics in politics ever since its inception. The original idea behind the College was that, back in the 1700s, when communications were slow, voters were uninformed, and votes were counted by hand, the Framers needed a streamlined and efficient system for electing the President. The college worked – and made sense – back then. The question is: does it still apply today? Today, Americans have the technology to vote directly for a President, yet they don’t.
A few criticisms the Electoral College holds is that it has outlives its usefulness and that the campaigns place more focus on the swing states. Although many believe we should not use the Electoral College as a method for choosing a president, this method has been used for decades and it should continue to be used. For those, that want to put an end to this method of electing a president and a vice president it will not be easy. The Electoral College was created to make it easier in an organized manner on deciding who the president will be. A reason why the Electoral College exists is because it is in the Constitution.
To Dan Newhouse, Although some people say the electoral college is best for the public, it is actually putting chains on their opinions. Many people would say that the founding fathers made the electoral college because it was the best way to vote in their time. But what they don’t realise is that the electoral college is outdated, we have more people, and technology now, and that allows everyone to vote. That is why the electoral college should be stopped, so the chains that keep the citizens opinion’s down are broken.
However, many states make a requirement for the electors to vote for the candidate with the most votes of that state. The Electoral College was originally created to prevent the people of the United States from having too much power. Mainly because the creators of the Constitution, were very wary of any one group acquiring too much power. Also, at the time of the creation of the Constitution, it was almost impossible for citizens to be able to go and cast
The framers at the Constitution Convention believed that the president should be indirectly voted for. The framers thought the citizens were not smart enough and were uninformed to be able to elect their own leader. They knew their leader had to be chosen in an informed process that would consider the desires of every citizen without giving away too much power to one group. The delegates did not trust that the voters had enough information to be able to vote on their own. This lead to the creation of the Electoral College.
The Electoral College system assures balanced power between the states, puts the independent parties under control, grants balanced voting, and supports the major political parties. The Electoral College has proven itself to be very sufficient in determining the president and the vice president of the United States. Since this system has been successful since our Founding Fathers created it, there should be no reason as to why we should get rid of the Electoral
The Electoral College is a flawed system in which we choose our commander and chief of this country. The job of the electoral college is to determine the president and vice president. Each state has electors equal to the number of senators and representatives given to them specifically. There are 538 electors that are currently in the United States. Electors are appointed by state legislature and must be committed to a party.
A voting U.S. citizen does not directly elect the President and Vice President; instead, these voters directly elect designated intermediaries called "electors," who almost always have pledged to vote for particular presidential and vice presidential candidates. Many Americans believe that their vote directly affects who leads the election but that is simply not true. They are voting for their state Electoral College to vote for that candidate. The Electoral College was made way back when, so it has its pros and cons. Is this the right way to vote for the president of the United States.