the electoral college

shall it be abolished? I think so

if you voted other, please talk about it, if you care to, or if you voted no

Personally I think it should be abolished, that way each person has 1 vote, and bigger states wouldn't have the advantage due to more electoral votes.

Aurora151989 said:

shall it be abolished? I think so

if you voted other, please talk about it, if you care to, or if you voted no

Personally I think it should be abolished, that way each person has 1 vote, and bigger states wouldn't have the advantage due to more electoral votes.

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Absolutely, a simple popular vote is what we need. A Republican voting in my state can't really argue that their vote meant anything. It's not really fair that random swing states get all the power.

Aurora151989 said:

shall it be abolished? I think so

if you voted other, please talk about it, if you care to, or if you voted no

Personally I think it should be abolished, that way each person has 1 vote, and bigger states wouldn't have the advantage due to more electoral votes.

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I voted no. I am too lazy to explain why, when someone has already done so in an older thread:

Coolguy said:

No, the Electoral College serves a purpose.
The People were never meant to vote for the President.
To allow this would be unfair/unequal representation of the States.
The People already have their representation through Congress.

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Coolguy said:

Ah, because the State itself needs to be recognized separately from the People?
We are a Nation of States, not a Nation of individuals.

Why should a minority of States with the largest populations be able to dictate to a majority of States who will be the President?
The Electoral College strikes a balance. Does it not?

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thank you for the quotes emdash, I probably would have never found that on my own.

The states still have different numbers of electoral votes based on the state population though.

Aurora151989 said:

thank you for the quotes emdash, I probably would have never found that on my own.

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You're welcome.

Aurora151989 said:

The states still have different numbers of electoral votes based on the state population though.

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That's the compromise I guess. More populous states have a little more sway, without rendering the less populous states completely irrelevant.

emdash said:

You're welcome.



That's the compromise I guess. More populous states have a little more sway, without rendering the less populous states completely irrelevant.

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Sort of, but the MOST populous states are usually givens for one of the parties. New York and Cali always go to the dems, and Texas always goes to the Republicans. You can't really say these states make or break elections. The states that have way more clout are the more middle sized states that are ideologically divided. States like Florida, Pennsylvania, Illinios.

If you live in one of the states that's a given but you're in the minority party, you're out of luck. Your vote doesn't really mean anything.

Pal said:

Sort of, but the MOST populous states are usually givens for one of the parties. New York and Cali always go to the dems, and Texas always goes to the Republicans. You can't really say these states make or break elections. The states that have way more clout are the more middle sized states that are ideologically divided. States like Florida, Pennsylvania, Illinios.

If you live in one of the states that's a given but you're in the minority party, you're out of luck. Your vote doesn't really mean anything.

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You could do the house by popular vote but not the senate and not the presidency.

Edit: Although, I'd be afraid to let the cat out of the bag.

Pal said:

Sort of, but the MOST populous states are usually givens for one of the parties. New York and Cali always go to the dems, and Texas always goes to the Republicans. You can't really say these states make or break elections. The states that have way more clout are the more middle sized states that are ideologically divided. States like Florida, Pennsylvania, Illinios.

If you live in one of the states that's a given but you're in the minority party, you're out of luck. Your vote doesn't really mean anything.

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Your vote might seem insignificant to you, but without electoral votes, less populous states would always be stuck with a President chosen for them by other people. That's why the compromise is necessary.

Your vote carries more weight in your district, where you elect Congressmen to represent your views. If you're the only liberal in a conservative area, you might have to move to get the kind of help you want from the federal government.

Yes, the electoral college should be gotten rid of. Just because you live in a small state, your vote should not count for more than mine. A popular vote would be a much better system.

I voted "Other." I don't like the current electoral college system because it's too unwieldy and, because it gives all of a state's electoral votes to whoever wins the plurality of votes in that state, discounts the minority vote too much. However, I would like a type of electoral college, as without it urban areas that are more populous would have more say than rural areas.

So I would prefer it if we retained the electoral college but used the Congressional District Method, or the Maine-Nebraska Method. In this method, whichever candidate wins a plurality of votes in a district gets that district's electoral vote, which represents the electoral votes provided for by their number of Representatives, and whichever candidate wins a plurality of votes statewide gets an additional two electoral votes, which represents the electoral votes provided for by their number of Senators. This way large swing states will be less of a factor since a state's electoral votes will be divided up amongst their districts. It will also give a more accurate account of the wishes of the population without totally getting rid of the electoral college system.

Now, as a corollary to this, I think we should also adopt the Wyoming Rule, which would dictate that the Representative-to-population ratio in the House be that of the smallest entitled unit. If it were to be implemented, the least populous state is Wyoming, so Wyoming would get only one Representative and a state that has twice the population of Wyoming would get two Representatives and so on. This would put the number of seats in the House at 569 and lead to a better House that better represents it's people.

Those are the kinds of reforms I support.

I say yes because governments should represent the will of the people and everyone's vote should count the same.

Aurora151989 said:

shall it be abolished? I think so

if you voted other, please talk about it, if you care to, or if you voted no

Personally I think it should be abolished, that way each person has 1 vote, and bigger states wouldn't have the advantage due to more electoral votes.

Click to expand...

Sorry, you've got that backwards.

If it wasn't for the electoral college, smaller states would be utterly ignored in the Prez elections, because their lack of voters would make them of little value.

As it is, since most small states give all their electoral votes to the candidate who wins their majority of voters, small states do matter.

We are not a democracy and were not intended to be a democracy. We're a Republic, with built-in measures intended to prevent a tyranny of the majority.

Goshin said:

We are not a democracy and were not intended to be a democracy. We're a Republic, with built-in measures intended to prevent a tyranny of the majority.

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We're a democratic republic. A republic is any non-monarchical form of government. That includes dictatorships, military juntas, etc. We are a republic with democratic aspects. How democratic we should be is up to debate.

I voted no. I do not want states like New York and California having practically all the say while most of the other states get ignored.

Goshin said:

Sorry, you've got that backwards.

If it wasn't for the electoral college, smaller states would be utterly ignored in the Prez elections, because their lack of voters would make them of little value.

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Well, the first question is whether the President represents the people or the states. If you think he represents states, then you might have a point, but I don't think you'll ever find a Presidential candidate who thinks he represents states.

Presidents NOW ignore the small states. Seriously. I posted a map in another thread on this that showed where the Presidents campaign. They go to maybe 10 states that are the most "purple" and ignore the rest. Why campaign in California or Texas? You know how they will vote. And the same is true of almost every small state. No one visited Idaho or Montana in the last campaign. Seriously.

A popular vote means ALL votes will count. You'll grab for a vote anywhere, because even a vote in a state you will lose will help you. Presidents will go MORE places than they do now because of that.

Seriously, ask any campaign expert. A national popular election will change everything.

Honestly, I don't care if one state has more of a say then another. That doesn't mean anything. All you should care about is that your vote means as much as everyone elses. If you vote for a democrat in Texas you would still be helping your candidate. Even if you live in a tiny state like Wyoming, your vote as an individual matters just as much as someone in California.

I voted no. I will offer another reason to keep the Electoral College:

Chappy said:

… [T]he Electoral College serves a real purpose today: it creates a firewall so that when close elections occur, recounts and controversies are limited to just one or two states rather than across all fifty. A nationwide presidential recount would cripple the political system for weeks if not months.

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The chance of a Presidential recount i much much smaller than the chance of an individual state recount where there are less voters.

Groucho said:

Well, the first question is whether the President represents the people or the states. If you think he represents states, then you might have a point, but I don't think you'll ever find a Presidential candidate who thinks he represents states.

Presidents NOW ignore the small states. Seriously. I posted a map in another thread on this that showed where the Presidents campaign. They go to maybe 10 states that are the most "purple" and ignore the rest. Why campaign in California or Texas? You know how they will vote. And the same is true of almost every small state. No one visited Idaho or Montana in the last campaign. Seriously.

A popular vote means ALL votes will count. You'll grab for a vote anywhere, because even a vote in a state you will lose will help you. Presidents will go MORE places than they do now because of that.

Seriously, ask any campaign expert. A national popular election will change everything.

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This is pretty much irrelevant to the part of his post you left out.

As it is, since most small states give all their electoral votes to the candidate who wins their majority of voters, small states do matter.

We are not a democracy and were not intended to be a democracy. We're a Republic, with built-in measures intended to prevent a tyranny of the majority. - Goshin

A popular vote in a nation of well over 300 million would be costly, complex, and very prone to corruption. Republics were made for a simplification of the process, and to ensure that someone always speaks for you on a local, regional, and national level.

Blackdog said:

This is pretty much irrelevant to the part of his post you left out.

As it is, since most small states give all their electoral votes to the candidate who wins their majority of voters, small states do matter.

We are not a democracy and were not intended to be a democracy. We're a Republic, with built-in measures intended to prevent a tyranny of the majority. - Goshin

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I guess it depends on what you consider "majority" and "tyrrany", huh? Right now, a minority of people in a majority of states can impose their will, like they did in 2000. Does that bother you? You think that quote was referring to a majority of states or a majority of people?

Personally, it doesn't matter to me what people 225 years ago thought about what the country should be like. I am more interested in what it really is today. Holding on to some old notion like a misguided Amish farmer doesn't appeal to me.

The founders also thought women were property and blacks were less than property, and that only property owners had a right to say what the government should do. The fact that they thought states were more important than people (at a time when the US was much more like a confederation of individual countries, and where traveling from state to state could take months) is of little importance today.

"What best serves us today? What is the best for our country?" Those are the questions to ask, not "What best meets the standards of people from a time long gone?"

Groucho said:

The chance of a Presidential recount i much much smaller than the chance of an individual state recount where there are less voters.

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That's true although, given the electorate scale, a “close” nationwide outcome might be a matter of tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of votes. Al Gore's “margin of victory” in 2000 was 543,895.¹

Plus, California doesn't have an “official” certified count including absentees and challenged ballots until weeks later. While Democrats have dominated lately, so it's been easy to call precisely who “won” California on election night, the magnitude of that victory based on the actual tally, comes considerably later and could definitely have a sufficient swing to affect the outcome of a very close national election.

Combine that with 49 other states, and, while you might have a pretty good idea of who won the election on election night or the following day, you might have weeks to wait to know for certain and think of the mayhem as lawyers were flown to principalities in search of more votes or to discredit other votes.

And, if, after weeks of waiting for the final count, we found that it was necessary to have a nationwide recount; can you imagine the costs and the chaos? The risks associated to such an outcome, albeit unlikely, are enormous.

No, I think the Electoral College prevents those events from happening outside of one or two states, and spares the rest of the nation for the most part from suffering those consequences.

emdash said:

Your vote might seem insignificant to you, but without electoral votes, less populous states would always be stuck with a President chosen for them by other people. t.

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If your guy loses, your president is always chosen by other people. A persons vote means more without the electoral college. If your state overwhelmingly supports one candidate your vote is meaningless.
The electoral college was a horrible idea.

Groucho said:

I guess it depends on what you consider "majority" and "tyrrany", huh? Right now, a minority of people in a majority of states can impose their will, like they did in 2000. Does that bother you? You think that quote was referring to a majority of states or a majority of people?

Personally, it doesn't matter to me what people 225 years ago thought about what the country should be like. I am more interested in what it really is today. Holding on to some old notion like a misguided Amish farmer doesn't appeal to me.

The founders also thought women were property and blacks were less than property, and that only property owners had a right to say what the government should do. The fact that they thought states were more important than people (at a time when the US was much more like a confederation of individual countries, and where traveling from state to state could take months) is of little importance today.

"What best serves us today? What is the best for our country?" Those are the questions to ask, not "What best meets the standards of people from a time long gone?"

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The electoral college meets our needs just fine. It keeps the dead voters in Chicago and the homeless guys getting a pack of cigarettes from deciding who our president is.

Sometimes old is better.

Chappy said:

That's true although, given the electorate scale, a “close” nationwide outcome might be a matter of tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of votes. Al Gore's “margin of victory” in 2000 was 543,895.¹

Plus, California doesn't have an “official” certified count including absentees and challenged ballots until weeks later. While Democrats have dominated lately, so it's been easy to call precisely who “won” California on election night, the magnitude of that victory based on the actual tally, comes considerably later and could definitely have a sufficient swing to affect the outcome of a very close national election.

Combine that with 49 other states, and, while you might have a pretty good idea of who won the election on election night or the following day, you might have weeks to wait to know for certain and think of the mayhem as lawyers were flown to principalities in search of more votes or to discredit other votes.

And, if, after weeks of waiting for the final count, we found that it was necessary to have a nationwide recount; can you imagine the costs and the chaos? The risks associated to such an outcome, albeit unlikely, are enormous.

No, I think the Electoral College prevents those events from happening outside of one or two states, and spares the rest of the nation for the most part from suffering those consequences.

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Eh, to me, it's more important to know who won than it is to have a quick answer. Accuracy is more important than immediacy. Most elections have not been that close, also.

The President should represent the people, not the states.