Conventional wisdom says the candidate with the most votes is elected President. American politics disagrees. It is indirect elections via the Electoral College.
Neither part of a university system nor the equivalent of a British high school, the Electoral College is a group of selected delegates that ultimately pick the President of the USA. Never meeting as a national body, the electors chosen by each state elect the president. According to the Federal Election Commissionof the USA, in the 2000 presidential election, Vice President Al Gore won the majority of votes casts by the American citizens: Gore = 50,999,897 (48.38%); Bush = 50,456,002 (47.87%). However, the Supreme Court decision aside, the final electoral vote count was Bush 271; Gore 266. 537 electoral votes counted more than 101 million citizen votes (one person one vote.)
The college was modified by the twelfth amendment and is part of the compromise made at the Constitutional Convention of 1787. This process gives the states power in how to select the electors and subsequently the President of the USA. Small states become increasingly important because their citizen votes per electoral vote ratio are low.
Delegates: The American experiment was designed for ordinary citizens in each state to have a say in who the president would be, but the final decision would be made by people who were considered “most capable” about the candidates and the issues as stated by Hamilton in Federalist Paper #68. These capable men would be chosen by the states in a process that was chosen by the individual state. Similar to the process of selecting a party delegate, electoral delegates are loyal party individuals.
Selection Process: When the citizen voter votes for a presidential candidate, they are (in most cases) voting for a slate of party delegates representing that party in the Electoral College. State political parties chose their “slate” of electors and when a candidate wins the popular vote, those delegates become the state's electoral delegates.
During the Constitutional Convention, there were no political parties and the delegates were respected members of the state. There must be “…respect for the natural aristae,” as Jefferson said in his letters to Madison on Rights. In some states, state legislatures selected the electors but as Hamilton believed: “Nothing was more to be desired than that every practicable obstacle should be opposed to cabal, intrigue, and corruption.” Today elector members are chosen for their loyalty to the party and some of Jefferson's fears have arisen.
Electoral Winner: All but Maine and Nebraska have a “winner takes all” policy of dividing electoral votes. The winner of the popular vote in a state captures all that state’s electoral votes. In this fashion it is easy to see that the proportional citizen votes per electoral vote ratio of a state is extremely important. It is this process that allows a presidential candidate (as in Gore v. Bush) to win the national popular vote, yet loose the election because of fewer electoral votes.
Electoral Vote: When the voters of a state vote for a candidate on “election day,” they are in most cases electing a slate of party electors. These individuals will represent their political candidate in the Electoral College. It is a common misperception that citizens can choose a candidate of one party and an electorate of the rival party will become a presidential electorate for that state.
Flaws most definitely exist; however, this is not one. The electoral vote will closely represent, at least the political party of the presidential candidate. While true the electorate can vote for the rival candidate, it is unlikely that he would do so (Ray v. Blair, 343 U.S. 214.)
The copyright of the article What Is the Electoral College? in US President is owned by Frank W. Hardy. Permission to republish What Is the Electoral College? in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.
