Electoral College Reform
... of the states follow this winner-take-all method of allocating the electoral votes. Maine and Nebraska are the only two states that do not award the winner of the popular vote all of their electoral votes. Maine and Nebraska, the two states that allocate their votes differently, “divide their Electoral College votes according to which candidate wins a particular congressional district in that state” (Cossolotto 2). This method is essentially proportional allocation, which is the best modification for the Electoral College. The current method of electing the President is extremely ineffective. The most obvious example of the ineffectiveness of the Electoral College is that four presidents have been elected without winning the popular vote. According to Schlesinger, “All our minority presidents—John Quincy Adams in 1825, Rutherford B. Hayes in 1877, Benjamin Harrison in 1889—had wretched and ineffectual administrations and served only a single term” (1). In 2000, George W. Bush won the presidency without winning the popular vote. Bush fits right in with the other minority presidents, except he’s facing a second term with strong opposition. The ultimate question when facing this issue is how these people won the presidency. When over half of the country is opposed to this person being the president, they should not be allowed to run the country. The purpose of the Electoral College is to keep the smaller states part of the election process. However, the exact opposite is taking place. Candidates now visit larger states more frequently because they have the most electoral votes and, therefore, the most weight in the election. “A party’s strength in a presidential election depends on whether or not it can carry enough states to gain a majority of the electoral votes” (Gray 124). Knowing this, the candidates are obviously biased towards certain states. Carolyn Jefferson-Jenkins, the leader of the League of Women Voters pointed out several problems with the Electoral College. “First, a citizen’s individual vote has more weight if he or she lives in a state with a small population than if the citizen lives in a state with a large population. Moreover, the electoral vote does not reflect the volume of voter participation within a state. If only a few voters go to the polls, all the electoral votes of the state are still cast. Finally, the Electoral College system is flawed because the Constitution does not bind presidential electors to vote for the candidates to whom they have been pledged” (8). The biggest problem with the Electoral College is definitely the winner-take-all allocation system. “The winner-take-all system, in which all of a state's electoral votes go to the winner of the popular vote, disenfranchises those who voted for other candidates in that state. Their votes simply don't count” (Jefferson-Jenkins 5). This method causes inequality among voters, which can lead to a decrease in voter turnout. “One person, one vote is the guiding principle of our representative democracy” (Jefferson-Jenkins 5). How can the loser of the popular vote win the presidential election? The answer should be they can’t. Millions of Americans were crushed in 2000 when George W. Bush won the presidency without winning the popular vote. I was one of them. I couldn’t understand how the people’s choice wasn’t in office. In order completely to remodel this unfair process a Constitutional amendment must take place, and be supported by most of the countries powerful politicians in order to pass. It is unlikely an amendment like this will ever pass. “From 1889 through 1946 there were 109 proposed amendments, from 1947 to 1968 there were 265, and since then, virtually every session of Congress has seen its own batch of proposals. Still, the Electoral College simply refuses to die” (Schwarz 1). Since an amendment is unlikely to ever pass, a solution must be worked around the federal government. The most obvious choice to fix the Electoral College would be to scrap the system all together and rely solely on the popular vote. Besides the fact that such an unlikely amendment would need to occur, there are several other problems with this system. Direct elections “would further weaken the already weak party system. They would provide a potent incentive to single-issue zealots, freelance media adventurers and eccentric billionaires to jump into presidential contests” (Schlesinger 1). Direct election could cause more of a problem than the current Electoral College system. The best way to reform the Electoral College would be proportionally to allocate the electoral votes. The easiest way to accomplish this would be by having each sta...