09 Oct 2004
With the approach of the Presidential Election, we can expect the usual howls, letters, editorials and commentaries demanding that the Electoral College be abolished. If they hold true to past form, few of these will make their complaints clear, beyond acrimonious rebuke of a system that the writers probably don't understand. Probably none will present adequate details of a proposed alternative. MSN Slate's "America's Worst College" is typical.

In the interest of moving this issue from rhetoric and hyperbole to the forum of considered discussion, I offer the following outline for an ordered argument to the electoral college "Abolitionists".
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• Problem - State what is wrong:
  State the problem to be solved. Why get rid of the Electoral College? What harm is it doing? How would things be better otherwise? How does this effect me or any other listener? The answers to these or to similar questions are not axiomatic. Descriptives such as "undemocratic" or "antiquated" are simply slogans which do not explain how the Electoral System is harmful or deficient..
  
  
• Solution - Present a solution to the problem:
  Here's where the real work goes. Let's assume a nationwide solution, almost certainly requiring an amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
  The least of the problems, but one requiring address at this point, is that "electoral college" does not appear in the Constitution. The term refers to the meeting of the electors to elect the President. ( A "college" is group of colleagues, originally meaning a meeting of the clergy.) An amendment that says, "The Electoral College is hereby abolished", would merely create an absurdity. The Constitution would still require the states to provide electors, but the amendment would prevent the electors from meeting.
  
  To approach this systematically, refer to Article II - Section 1 and Amendment XII of the U.S. Constitution as a guide. These sections contain the constitutional requirements of the current presidential electoral system. A major change in the electoral system would probably have the effect of replacing much of the text in both sections.
  To list some of the more significant questions:
  • a. What will elect the president? (We'll assume herein that it is to be the majority of a popular vote.)
    
  • b. What will be done if no candidate has a majority? Unless there are only two candidates, the candidate with the most votes will often lack a majority. In the 1992 Presidential Election, Bill Clinton won the electoral vote while receiving only 43% of the popular vote, the rest going to George Bush and Ross Perot. That means that 57% of the voters wanted someone else. (Can't say as I blame them.) In a 4-or-5-way contest, the popular percentage for the majority candidate could be much lower. Possible resolutions could be to put the election in the House of Representatives (current system), have a national runoff election (almost too terrible to contemplate), or to use preferential voting such as instant runoff (even more confusing than punch cards or butterfly ballots).
    
  • c. Will the state legislatures continue to make the rules for their respective election boards, or will the presidential election become our first nationally administered election?
    
  • d. Relative to question c, will candidate qualifications for inclusion on the presidential ballot now have to be placed in the Constitution to assure uniformity thoughout the several states?
    Be sure to check Amendments XX, XXII, XXIII and XXV for any impact of the proposed change on the office of president.
  
  
• Satisfaction - Describe the Solution's effect on the Problem:
  Show, with examples, that the Solution is an improvement over the Problem.
  I can't give any realistic examples. The best popular vote proposals I've heard won't change anything much; the worst would invite court challenges and fraud before, during, and after elections. All proposals seem to invite federal meddling in local affairs.
  

• The Constitution does not require a popular vote for the electors of the president.
• The Constitution does not require that all electoral votes from one state go to a single candidate. If you don't like the "winner-take-all" rule, take the matter up with your state legislature. Nebraska and Maine, and by 2 Nov 2004 possibly Colorado, allocate their electoral votes in proportion to their popular votes.
• The Constitution doesn't use the term "electoral college." (Mentioned above)
• All popular elections for federal office (congressmen, senators, electors of the president) are currently administered by the states.
• Currently, no presidential candidate "wins" the popular vote. Only the electoral vote is "won".
  
• The National Archives has info on the current electoral system.
• For a good non-hysterical look at the electoral system with some proposals, see "An Overview and Analysis of Reform Proposals".

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