Centerville High School

Centerville, South Dakota

Teacher: Terri Buechler

 

The Electoral College

By Luke Surprenant

                                                               

 

First, to understand all of this we probably need the definition of Electoral College.  Every party in each state picks a group of electors equally to the state’s congressional delegation representatives plus the senators. These groups of electors pledge to vote for the nominees of their party yet they are not required to do so. When we vote for the President and Vice President, they are actually voting for these groups of electors. Then these groups or slates of electors meet in their Nations capitol on the first Monday after the second Wednesday in December. They then vote on ballots separately for the President and the Vice president from each state, and they have one of the candidates to vote for a nonresident of their own state.  Lists of votes are then cast for the two offices.  The elections are then decided by the total Electoral College vote.

           

There is always a good and bad point to this system as is every system. The weakness of this system is that the winner of the popular vote in the state wins all of the Electoral College votes.  There have been cases that some candidates have been elected with less than a popular vote.  Another problem with the Electoral College is the requirement that the election has to go to the House of Representatives in order to determine the outcome of the Vice president if the Electoral College fails to reach a majority. This would result in a long pause in determining the entire election.

           

There are several proposed changes instead of using the Electoral College, one is to substitute the direct popular vote for the President. The second one is the choice of the electors by districts. The third one is the elimination of the electors as individuals. Although there might be a threat to the two party systems if the Electoral cCollege is changed.

           

Many of the opinions are to change the Electoral College still others want to get rid of the entire thing. One element is to eliminate the winner-take-all features of the Electoral College. One wonders why we would eliminate the Electoral College when we have used the same system for over two hundred years.

           

I really have no opinion on this system or anything related to it but there are people who have pros and cons. Some of them are that the system is way outdated; also that it is too complicated to just let the people vote. I guess I do have an opinion I think that it is wrong that some states like South Dakota have only three electoral votes. Why should only the big states have the opportunity to change the election. If you want my opinion we should just vote, why confuse everything with the Electoral College. How about we vote in each for a Vice president and the President in each state and whoever wins the person gets the state instead of voting six or seven times just vote once or twice.

           

What I would like to see is all of this confusion cleared up by the government. The incident that happened in Florida this past election, I think that was pretty pathetic, voting to me should not be confusing and high tech. Why not just have a card and a permanent maker and put a check mark next to the person that you want to vote for. I think that the government is making things way to complicated for a relatively simple thing.

           

Although the Electoral College system has been working for the last many years. They also have the right idea if you were to break up the voting system we have right now your vote would mean a lot less in the whole vote, but using the electoral college system your vote means a lot more. Some may argue that the Electoral College prevents third party candidates from competing for president. This may be true, but many of the ideas of the third party candidates are addressed and incorporated into the two primary political parties. This helps ensure stability in our country and has prevented our country from moving on from one extreme to another.

 

I would hope that those who are against the Electoral College, to at least study the system closely and make an educated decision. It does not matter what side you take, just be sure to consider all the facts and opinions on this important issue. This is not an issue that should be taken lightly. It could have profound effects on our country.

 

Required Questions

 

1.      How and when did the United States elect a president and vice president of different parties? Name them and their respective parties.

-         The way that they elected their president and vice was the person with the most votes became the President and the person with the second most votes won the spot for Vice President.

-         They elected them in 1976.

-The president and their parties were John Adams (federalists) and Thomas Jefferson (republican)

2. Describe four ways that were suggested to elect the president between 1808 and 1846

-         The four ways that were suggested to elect were, lot, direct vote, regional election Electoral College votes or automatic plan.

      3.Name five U.S. presidents who were elected with less than a popular vote.

-Five presidents with less than a popular vote were Polk, Taylor, Buchanan, Lincoln, and Hayes.

4.Describe the winner take all system. Which state uses this system?

-         The winner take all system is provides that whoever gets the popular vote gets all of that state’s electoral votes.

-         Maine is the state that uses this system

5. When do electors get to vote and when are the results know?

-         Although the results from the popular vote are known in November according to Article II Section 1:3 of the Constitution, “The Congress mar determine the time of choosing the electors, and the day on which they shall give their votes; which day shall be the same throughout the united states. “ That day has been set as the first Monday after the second Wednesday in December. In January the votes are counted before both houses and the results are officially announced.

6. What effect would substituting a direct popular vote for the Electoral College have on third party candidates? Why?

-         The substitution of the popular vote for the Electoral College would encourage the third party. Under the proportional plan, urban areas loose power, as they would with any plan other than the current winner take all system.

7.Give four arguments for and against a direct vote system.

FOR- There would be equal weight to every vote; it would do away with the faithless elector problem.

 AGAINST-Two major parties are split up the other one will win, and it would weaken the power of the states.

8. Describe the differences between the district plan, proportional plan, and the winner take all plan.

-         There are many differences between the district plan, the proportional plan and the winner take all plan. The district plan they provide an elector for each congressional district.

-         Under the proportional plan a small homogeneous state could yield more to a candidate than could a large diverse state.

-         The winner take all plan the candidate with the most votes gets all of the electoral votes for the state.

9. State the four points experts in 1969 agreed should be an ideal plan for electing U.S. presidents

-         The first point is the need for a quick decision and clear-cut winner. The second is the victor should be the people’s choice winner of the most popular votes. The third the president elect should have a mandate to govern a legitimacy, which comes from a good margin of victory. The last point is the ideal system should not undermine the two party system.

10. What did democrats mean when they claimed some votes in Florida had never been counted; not even once?

            -They say that even though that the chad was punched out of the card that the machine never read it and thus it was not counted.

           

11. Do you think Florida and the U.S. supreme Courts politicized their decisions? Explain. Did you read the court decisions posted on many sites on the Internet?

            -I really don’t think that they did, I mean that they could have tried a lot harder for most of this.

            -No, I didn’t read any of the court decisions or anything because I think that politics are too boring for me.

12. Did the election in 2000 make you ashamed or proud to be an American? Explain.

            - I really don’t have any opinion on any of this. What I do think is that the legal system needs to be a bit upgraded so this stuff doesn’t happen again.                          [Back]