ipl-logo

Electoral College Essay

1134 Words5 Pages

Electoral College
What? That is what most people say when you explain to them what the electoral college is. It is a very complicated system. In this paper, the electoral college will be broken down and hopefully, it will be easier to understand. The electoral college is currently used in our elections. Most people think that when they vote that they are voting directly for their political candidate. That is not true. The electoral college plays an even bigger role. In this paper, we will investigate and learn 3 things. First, how the electoral college started. Next, how it works today. Finally, why we have it. The electoral college started in 1787. The Constitutional Convention picked presidents through Congress, Governors of States, a …show more content…

There could be many explanations as to why we have it, but there is one central reason. It all links back to our founding fathers and the end of the constitutional convention. At the end of the constitutional convention, the electoral votes were given to the Committee of Eleven and out of that Committee came the electoral college. Why didn’t they just leave it as the Committee of Eleven and just not change it to the electoral college? That is where the reason we have the electoral college comes in. The reason is that “The framers of the Constitution didn’t trust direct democracy”(Joe Miller) that is why the framers from the Committee of Eleven got the idea of creating an electoral college. The Electoral College would become an indirect democracy which sounded good to the founding fathers since they didn’t trust the idea of a direct one. What was so bad about a direct democracy? The founding fathers believed that a direct democracy, “would bring groups of citizens who have a common interest in some proposal that would either violate the rights of other citizens or would harm the nation as a whole”(Joe Miller). The founding fathers that took the most place in this discussion were James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, and Alexis de Tocqueville. These men wholeheartedly believed that a direct democracy would bring chaos and saw the electoral college as a solution. That is the reason why we have it. As can be seen, it is all a connection and once you make that connection it makes the reason for the having the electoral college a lot easier to

Show More
Related
298 Words | 2 Pages

Andrea Resendiz Mr. Holmes AP Gov 08 Dec 2017 FRQ 10 The Electoral College is a very confusing part of the American presidential election system. Why did the Founders of the U.S. Constitution set up an Electoral System? The Founders of the U.S. Constitution set up an electoral system because they didn't want the president to be elected directly by the people, but instead the national elite. How are the electoral votes broken down among the states?

Read More
955 Words | 4 Pages

The Electoral College has been our presidential election procedure since 1787. This system was created to indirectly choose the president in a way that fits the desire of the citizens, which also prevents uninformed voters from deciding upon the country’s leader. Each state receives one electoral vote for each member of Congress, which totals up to 538 electors.

Read More
564 Words | 3 Pages

The Electoral College is a system that was established in Article II, Section 1 of the United States Constitution. It is a system that is used to elect the next President of the United States. The number of electors are based on the number of seats a state holds in the Senate and the House of Representatives. So, when a voter places his ballot. It cast a vow for the elector of that state to vote towards that voted candidate (1).

Read More
1223 Words | 5 Pages

Since 1800 there have been over 700 proposals to either revise or eliminate the electoral college. The electoral college was added to the Constitution in 1787 to guarantee the best candidate was elected. The electoral college consists of electors who officially cast their votes for President. The number of electors for each state is determined by the number of congress members each state has. While there are no qualifications to become an elector, electors must follow the people's directive.

Read More
1206 Words | 5 Pages

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.

Read More
1663 Words | 7 Pages

The Electoral College 1. Identify the reasoning of the framers of the Constitution for creating such an unusual system by which we choose our presidents. a. In 1787 the Electoral College was created by the framers of the Constitution. They devised a method to elect a president that would ensure that the person elected would not gain too much power and independence.

Read More
923 Words | 4 Pages

While there is still a degree of dispute over the claim, many historians agree that the idea of the Electoral College came about late in the Constitutional Convention of 1787 through the Committee of Eleven on Postponed Matters. The members and of the Committee, along with the majority of the Founding Fathers, supported the idea of an Electoral College because they wanted residents in states with smaller populations to have an effect on the presidential election. Furthermore, the Founding Fathers supported the Electoral College because it helped to balance the vote of the general American people with the vote of the elite and knowledgeable electors. Moreover, the Electoral College provides insulation for the presidential election against political manipulation. In Federalist No. 68, Alexander Hamilton defended the idea of an Electoral College because he felt that it helped to protect the state’s power in presidential elections.

Read More
761 Words | 4 Pages

The Framers believed that implementing an Electoral College would help balance interests between the high-population and low-population states. “Opponents of the Electoral College believed that the system should be scrapped, stating that it was fundamentally flawed” (Stepman 2017). “One Founding-era argument for the Electoral College stemmed from the fact that ordinary Americans

Read More
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

Read More
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.

Read More
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

Read More
571 Words | 3 Pages

"The Electoral College was established in the constitution by the foundering fathers. It was a comprise of the election of the President by votes in Congress and choice of the President by a popular vote of a qualified citizen"(Nation Archives and Records Administration). The Electoral College consist of 538 electors and for a candidate to win the Presidency they only need to get 270 electoral votes which are the majority of the electoral. The process of the Electoral College starts with the selection of the electors. When people in a state vote, most assume that they are voting to elect a President, but they choosing electors.

Read More
460 Words | 2 Pages

Here in America, we are encouraged to vote for anyone we choose to vote for and told that every vote counts. There’s an exception to this rule because every four years during presidential elections the candidate with the most votes doesn’t always win; the winner is the one with the most Electoral College votes. The Electoral College is a necessity in the selection of the President of the United States. My goal in researching this topic is to better understand the role the Electoral College plays in selecting the President of the United States. This paper will look into the creation of the Electoral College, the requirements needed to be an Electoral College elector, the process of how the Electoral College votes are awarded, and

Read More
1082 Words | 5 Pages

The introduction of the system is often not given to people until they reach the age of voting or even later. Even then, there are not enough Americans who understand the concept or even why it was made. When the government was still in the phase of development, there were many discussions on voting and how to make it fair between states. Since the country was just starting to develop, not every state was equal in population, so some states needed more representation than others. Therefore, they created the Electoral College, which works in direct correlation with the number of representatives that a state has in Congress.

Read More
975 Words | 4 Pages

The Electoral College is a longstanding organization in place in the United States of America that was originally established by the Founding Fathers in create equality in presidential elections has become a topic of harsh criticism and controversy over the years. The Electoral College was established by the Founding Fathers of the United States at the Constitutional Convention of 1787 in order ensure there was representation of the people while keeping the best interests of the nation in mind (“What is the Electoral College?”). At the time of the writing of the Constitution, there were two main ideas on how to elect a president. The first was that there should be a simple vote of all eligible people and who ever gets the most votes becomes

Read More

More about Electoral College Essay

Related Topics

Open Document