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The pros and cons of the electoral college.
What if America decided to abolish the electoral college? Wouldn't it be more simple just to have simple majority vote?
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pat gilbert 50+
With the electoral college the representative has the right to vote in a manner that is the best for the country even if if defies the votes he represents.
I can be wrong on this and I may not be correct, if so I'm all ears.
Susan Anthony
The current system does not provide some kind of check on the "mobs." There have been 22,453 electoral votes cast since presidential elections became competitive (in 1796), and only 17 have been cast for someone other than the candidate nominated by the elector's own political party. 1796 remains the only instance when the elector might have thought, at the time he voted, that his vote might affect the national outcome. Since 1796, the Electoral College has had the form, but not the substance, of the deliberative body envisioned by the Founders. The electors now are dedicated party activists of the winning party who meet briefly in mid-December to cast their totally predictable rubberstamped votes in accordance with their pre-announced pledges.
If a Democratic candidate receives the most votes, the state's dedicated Democratic party activists who have been chosen as its slate of electors become the EC voting bloc. If a Republican candidate receives the most votes, the state's dedicated Republican party activists who have been chosen as its slate of electors become the EC voting bloc.
The U.S. Supreme Court has upheld state laws guaranteeing faithful voting by electors (because the states have plenary power over presidential electors).
pat gilbert 50+
If as you indicate in the first paragraph the mob (conservatives?) controls the vote then why does a democrat ever get elected?
I hear what you are saying in the second paragraph, but you don't mention the tyranny of the democracy which as become ridiculously onerous here in Calif to point of the state collapsing.
In the 3rd paragraph are you saying that EC is not a tool of a Republic?
Somewhat related is that under the 17th amendment U.S. senators became elected by popular vote further giving power to the tyranny of a democracy and eroding the Republic it was intended to be.
Susan Anthony
The issue is: One person, one vote, of whatever party.
National Popular Vote ensures that every vote is equal, every voter will matter, in every state, in every presidential election, and the candidate with the most votes wins, as in virtually every other election in the country.
Most Americans don't care whether their presidential candidate wins or loses in their state in presidential elections. . . they care whether he/she wins the White House. Voters want to know, that even if they were on the losing side, their vote actually was directly and equally counted and mattered to their candidate. Most Americans think it's wrong for the candidate with the most popular votes to lose. We don't allow this in any other election in our representative republic.
The National Popular Vote bill preserves the constitutionally mandated Electoral College and state control of elections. With NPV, the candidate with the most popular votes in all 50 states and DC would get the 270+ ELECTORAL COLLEGE votes from the enacting states. That majority of ELECTORAL COLLEGE votes guarantees the candidate with the most popular votes in all 50 states and DC wins the presidency.
The existence of the EC does not make us a Republic.
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/republic
Definition of REPUBLIC
(1) : a government having a chief of state who is not a monarch and who in modern times is usually a president (2) : a political unit (as a nation) having such a form of government
b (1) : a government in which supreme power resides in a body of citizens entitled to vote and is exercised by elected officers and representatives responsible to them and governing according to law (2) : a political unit (as a nation) having such a form of government
pat gilbert 50+
Can you please define "mob"?
This quote from a federalist paper from Madsen:
The Framers founded a republic because they recognized that mob rule could be just as great a threat to liberty as the rule of a king. Representation, Madison explains in Federalists 63, is “sometimes necessary as a defense to the people against their own temporary errors and delusions.” America’s constitutional framework thereby seeks to protect the people from the dangers of unchecked popular democracy. The people’s representatives, of course, remain ultimately accountable to the people who can vote them out of office as they see fit.
Susan Anthony
Most Americans want "one person, one vote," the candidate with the most votes wins, as in virtually every election in the country.
Unable to agree on any particular method, the Founding Fathers left the choice of method for selecting presidential electors exclusively to the states by adopting the language contained in section 1 of Article II of the Constitution-- "Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors . . ." The U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly characterized the authority of the state legislatures over the manner of awarding their electoral votes as "plenary" and "exclusive."
NPV preserves the Electoral College and state control of elections. It changes the way electoral votes are awarded in the EC.
The Republic is not in any danger from NPV.
NPV has nothing to do with pure democracy. Pure democracy is a form of government in which people vote on policy initiatives directly. With NPV, the U.S. would still be a representative democracy, in which citizens continue to elect the President by a majority of EC votes by states, to represent us and conduct the business of government in the periods between elections.
The current system does not provide some kind of check on voters. There have been 22,453 electoral votes cast since presidential elections became competitive (in 1796), and only 17 have been cast for someone other than the candidate nominated by the elector's own political party. 1796 remains the only instance when the elector might have thought, at the time he voted, that his vote might affect the national outcome. Since 1796, the EC has had the form, but not the substance, of the deliberative body envisioned by the Founders.
Electors now are dedicated party activists of the winning party who cast their totally predictable rubberstamp votes.
pat gilbert 50+