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Electoral College Be Abolished Dbq

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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. Small states are extremely over represented. The Electoral …show more content…

“In 1980 and 1992 the third party candidates received 6.6% and 18.9% of the popular vote but both received 0% of the Electoral Vote” (Document B). This is a significant difference of the popular vote and the electoral votes. It is not a correct representation of the citizens’ votes. Arthur Schlesinger wrote, “The abolition of state-by-state, winner-take-all electoral votes would speed the disintegration of the already weakened two-party system” (Document E). The Electoral College voters mostly belong to Republican and Democratic parties therefore they do not want a third party candidate to win. Arthur Schlesinger also wrote, “It (The abolition of the Electoral College) would encourage single-issue ideologues and eccentric millionaires to jump into president contests” (Document E). This is only an excuse made by those who support the traditions of the government because they do not want a new candidate with modern ideas for the United States government. Not only is this not a correct representation of the citizens’ votes, but also if it is sent to the House of

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"A candidate can win an election with just two hundred and seventy electoral votes" (Document A). This means that a candidate could potentially win an election by just persuading eleven out of the fifty-five states. The number of electors in each state is decided by the number that that state has in The House of Representatives and Senate combined. This causes more power/weight to be given to the smaller states, making states such as Alaska, with a population of 710,231 and Wyoming, with a population of 563,626 equal regardless of their population differences with both states having three electoral votes (Document A). A candidate could potentially become president by just winning over the small states because that it where the most electoral votes are (Document A).

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658 Words | 3 Pages

The electoral college is unfair to the third party because they don’t get votes from the electoral college. Based on the presidential election from 1980 and 1992, it have show that the third party don’t get electoral vote(Doc B). The third party have a disadvantage which make it impossible for the third party to win the election because of the “winner take it all” system. According to George Will, he say that it discriminate smaller party and only help the main two parties(Doc E). The electoral college supports a two party system, discourages third party, and thereby restrict choices available to the

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1206 Words | 5 Pages

Supporters of the continuation of the Electoral College assert that this institution brings forth equal importance among all states and that the voting of the president is the hands of a well educated body who will choose what is best for the country. In a letter written by Alex Hamilton to the state of New York, he praises the Electoral College in that the electoral body is composed of “men most capable of analyzing the qualities needed to be president… [and] will most likely possess the information and judgment needed for such complicated investigations” (Source A). The modern era today leaves no one uninformed especially when it comes to politics. The fact that the Electoral College wants the decision to be made by credible officials is commendable, but in the current world any civilian can access the most up to date information about presidential candidates with a click of a button. This entails that there is in fact no need for a separate party to carry out a decision for the citizens of America.

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1266 Words | 6 Pages

People vote for the candidates by voting for the electors that reflect the viewpoints of the particular candidate and their personal political opinion. With that said, the Electoral College is a winner take all system where the states have voted and the majority vote of the presidential candidate goes to the electors that then cast their votes for the states. The Founding Fathers created the Electoral College in the Constitution for a couple of reasons. Schulman (n.d.) states the first reason it was fabricated “was to create a buffer between population and the selection of a President” (p. 1). Although, another significant reason that the Electoral College was created was for equal representation in voting

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1338 Words | 6 Pages

If we somehow happened to be a capable vote, then we ought to have the capacity to really pick who might be president. The Electoral College removes that from us. The Electoral College is not by any stretch of the imagination reasonable for our rights and our opportunity. It, for the most part, takes away the ability to vote the president. The Electoral College was made in a period when votes were harder to gather and number.

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904 Words | 4 Pages

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

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868 Words | 4 Pages

The Electoral College should be discontinued because it gets rid of the people’s power that they have in the nation, it makes makes it so that every vote is an important vote, and the whole Electoral College system is messed up since each state has their own rules.

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796 Words | 4 Pages

Electoral college has been with us since the birth of the constitution, and to this day we are still using this type of system to this day. The Electoral College is a system that the United States uses to elect our upcoming presidents and vice presidents. Each state has electors equal to their senate member and house of representatives, however who ever gets the highest popular vote in the state gets the electoral vote. The issue is the Electoral College do not give votes to the people, but to the states. Which has some unfair consequences.

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1633 Words | 7 Pages

Although many have made their case against the Electoral College system, it is a necessary institution in the Presidential election because it preserves Federalism and encourages the two party system. One reason why the Electoral College is a necessary evil is because it secures the power of the states in the election, thereby upholding Federalism. As previously indicated, when citizens vote, they are voting for the amount of electors in their state to vote for their candidate of choice. The number of these electoral votes varies from state to state due to the fact that they are made up of the sum of its state’s Senators and House Representatives.

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1026 Words | 5 Pages

In 1787, years after the founding of the United States, the Constitutional Convention met to decide how the new nation would govern itself. The delegates understood that the need for a leader was necessary but still bitterly remembered how Britain abused of its power. The delegates agreed that the President and Vice President should be chosen informally and not based on the direct popular vote, thus gave birth to the Electoral College. The Electoral College is defined as “a body of people representing the states of the US, who formally cast votes for the election of the president and vice president.” Since 1787 the Electoral College has been the system for voting in the United States, but with our nation ever more changing and growing it

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828 Words | 4 Pages

The Electoral College is a system established by the United States Constitution to elect our country's President and Vice President. Although often viewed as one national election, it is a series of state elections. As originally designed, each state would choose a slate of electors that would then select the President and Vice President. This means that rather than voting directly for the President, people vote for certain electors who choose the President. This process has largely been sidelined and people today vote for a presidential candidate of a certain party rather than an elector.

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1530 Words | 7 Pages

The Electoral College is an outdated system and should be abolished before it turns the tables of an election for the bad. This system of voting was developed in 1787 and has had a strong impact on American citizens for 230 years. The Electoral College was created to take power from over populated states and distribute it to the less populated states. It also serves a higher authority than the popular vote, which can alter the results of many elections. In the 230 years of this system being in action, 4 elections have been modified to set the victor as someone who the population did not want.

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829 Words | 4 Pages

In short, the Electoral College was a solution to the question: “How should we pick our president impartially?” Much like any other point in the early American Government system, there was a long, arduous process of deciding who should be able to choose. Congress, State legislatures, and popular vote were all considered for the job, but none of them would suffice (Kimberling). This was because there was a definite threat of corruption in the government in its early stages of implementation in all three options. And so, a “Committee of Eleven” was created to provide an “indirect election of the president” (Kimberling).

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1511 Words | 7 Pages

“The votes of those living in small States count for more than those residing in large States” (Vandenburg 189). Many small states are assured 3 electoral votes regardless of population, giving them more power (Klinker, McClellan 1). “What remains of the Electoral College is merely a scheme for apportioning votes by state in a way that grossly distorts the principle of one person, one vote” (Klinker, McClellan 1). Some believe that the Electoral College protects

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494 Words | 2 Pages

During the Constitutional Convention in 1787, the Founding Fathers of America instituted the Electoral College. The Electoral College is a system in which the populous does not vote directly for a presidential candidate, but rather for representatives that would vote on their behalf. The political party that won the popular vote in a state would be able to have their state representatives vote in the election;the presidential candidate with the most electoral votes wins, so long as the votes reach 270 out of the 538 votes. Even though the representatives can go against their party, the Founding Fathers established this system to prevent a pure democracy and encourage coalition building.

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