Thing about the electoral collage is that it doesn’t matter what the large majority wants.
The problem with a simple majority is it allows large states to completely dominate less populated states.
We are a republic, kind of like how the UK is a union of (at least) four countries each with its own government. We are 50 states each with its own government and the constitutional right to make it’s own laws about matters not specifically delegated to the federal government (see the abortion rights debate).
The founding fathers established the electoral college as a compromise between electing the president in a vote by Congress and a popular vote. I would take an amendment to the constitution to get rid of it.
The founding fathers established the electoral college as a compromise between electing the president in a vote by Congress and a popular vote. I would take an amendment to the constitution to get rid of it.
They established it as a way to launder slave votes into presidential elections, as stated explicitly by the man responsible, James madison:
https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Madison/01-10-02-0065
There was one difficulty however of a serious nature attending an immediate choice by the people. The right of suffrage was much more diffusive in the Northern than the Southern States; and the latter could have no influence in the election on the score of the Negroes. The substitution of electors obviated this difficulty and seemed on the whole to be liable to fewest objections.
The electoral college exists because southerners were spoiled bitches who wanted more power than they deserved, then they threw a tantrum when they lost anyway (the Civil War), now they keep threatening and whining if they can’t keep their unfair advantage while gerrymandering to hell.
I’d be fine with the EC, if we also denied the electoral votes of states that don’t follow the constitution or ratify all the amendments (Mississippi still refuses to ratify the 24th banning the poll tax).
Thank you for that
The more I learn about the concessions made to the southern slave owners I wish the founders hadn’t tried so hard to include them in the union. The north and the south were so different it seems like it would be as doomed to failure as jamming all the Balkan states into a single country.
Every time Texas threatens to secede and doesn’t I wish we had the choice to vote them out so they could see just how badly they are not the hot shit they think they are.
All this went out the window when they capped the number of representatives in congress. That took away popular vote power. Montana doesn’t need 2 senators and a rep. North Dakota doesn’t need 2 senators and a rep. California is getting massively screwed on their representative count. That state alone should swing legislation based on reps alone. It would lay bare the tyranny of the minority.
