The Electoral College is Inherently Undemocratic

Factcheck.org: 


"The 2016 election was the most recent when the candidate who received the greatest number of electoral votes, and thus won the presidency, didn’t win the popular vote. But this scenario has played out in our nation’s history before.


In 1824, John Quincy Adams was elected president despite not winning either the popular vote or the electoral vote. Andrew Jackson was the winner in both categories. Jackson received 38,000 more popular votes than Adams, and beat him in the electoral vote 99 to 84. Despite his victories, Jackson didn’t reach the majority 131 votes needed in the Electoral College to be declared president. In fact, neither candidate did. The decision went to the House of Representatives, which voted Adams into the White House.


In 1876, Rutherford B. Hayes won the election (by a margin of one electoral vote), but he lost the popular vote by more than 250,000 ballots to Samuel J. Tilden.


In 1888, Benjamin Harrison received 233 electoral votes to Grover Cleveland’s 168, winning the presidency. But Harrison lost the popular vote by more than 90,000 votes.


In 2000, George W. Bush was declared the winner of the general election and became the 43rd president, but he didn’t win the popular vote either. Al Gore holds that distinction, garnering about 540,000 more votes than Bush. However, Bush won the electoral vote, 271 to 266.


In 2016, Donald Trump won the electoral vote by 304 to 227 over Hillary Clinton, but Trump lost the popular vote. Clinton received nearly 2.9 million more votes than Trump, according to an analysis by the Associated Press of the certified results in all 50 states and Washington, D.C."


All of the above are examples of flaws, not qualities of the Electoral College, established originally to ensure the perpetuation of a balance between slave and free states, should be relegation to the dustbin.  Many arguments have been advanced for its preservation, including federalism allowing each state the freedom to enact laws without maximizing the incentive of the number of votes cast. This argument is specious and defeats democratic (with a small d) principles. Other arguments include enhancement of small states based upon a geographic argument, encourages stability through a two party system and if a presidential candidate dies, then the College would be better positioned to elect a vice president. Also, proponents argue that the system insures more stability in the event of a recount and that it manages geographic discrepancies in population centers "balancing the vote so that rural communities are fairly treated. 


All of these arguments are specious.  Why are we obliged to maintain a strictly two-party system? Why not have candidates of various parties face the voters directly? And then have a run-off between the two highest vote recipients? Many Americans believe that neither party serves their interests. We are one country now, more so despite polarization of the populace by propaganda outlets like Fox News and people not willing to entertain or even listen to an opposing point of view. We are connected by Facebook, television, the internet, social media, smart phones, text messages, and no longer rely on a letter delivered by the post, which often took weeks to reach the other side of the nation, often by pony express. The argument that the Electoral College equalizes geographic space is silly. People are free to live where they wish, but should not be accorded three times the representation in Wyoming than in California. So, as it happens, it is not fair to urban voters.


Creative 21st century arguments in favor of the Electoral college belie the fundamental purposes of the it as originally conceived: To maintain the balance of slave and free states joining the Union, the disenfranchisement of slaves yet the tabulation of those unfortunate souls as 3/5ths of a person for the purpose of apportionment. In addition, the founders did not trust the uneducated, the ignorant, and the agrarian.  Women were not considered capable of rational thought and therefore were not entitled to the vote. 


Direct popular voting for the President of the United States may not have been altered the result in favor of a master of tweeting and of television celebrity. Perhaps. But in the disastrous results of the 2016 election where the votes of 3 million Americans were nullified by a 18th century relic, it is time for some serious revisions in the Constitution. Antonin Scalia and Neil Gorsuch might not agree. The Constitution should stay just as it was in 1787.


The stronger arguments rests with the interpretation of the 14th amendment, which guaranteed suffrage to all voters save women (another subject).


"The second section I consider the most important in the article. It fixes the basis of representation in Congress. If any State shall exclude any of her adult male citizens from the elective franchise, or abridge that right, she shall forfeit her right to representation in the same proportion. The effect of this provision will be either to compel the States to grant universal suffrage or so shear them of their power as to keep them forever in a hopeless minority in the national Government, both legislative and executive.

Thaddeus Stevens, in the United States Senate, May 8, 1866" - The 14th amendment


One could argue that since the passage of the 14th amendment, the Electoral College has abrogated equality of vote. The will of the people has been stifled by an inherently undemocratic system that apportions votes in the Senate giving people in Wyoming, for example three times the representation of people in California and almost the same disparity in Florida?


There have been numerous attempts to reform this thorn in the side of our civic polity. All have failed. Now, more than ever, we each need the same voice in choosing our President. A two-month television campaign, use of social media, public financing, the overturning of Citizen's United, and a truly democratic one-person one-vote be they live in California, New Hampshire or Iowa.


Looking at the result of the most recent election, the majority of Americans, it is again confirmed, have surrendered their franchise to the minority.  Some intrepid souls should organize a march on Washington.

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