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Melissa Seideman

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Direct popular vote should replace the Electoral College.

Please state your opinion here about this debate and respond to one other person.

Pro- Lindy and Miranda
Con- Claudia and Caitriona

Debate is on Thursday.

Topics: Electoral College Presidential Election elections
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  • Kiran Kalantri

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    Jan 2 2013: I believe the popular vote should replace the Electoral College. However, I believe that we should use the Electoral College as an archetype for a new popular vote system. For example, we could use the number of electoral votes each state has (ex: New york is twenty nine) and divide them according to their percentage of votes. This would help avoid the infinite amount of recounts that would most likely occur in close elections.Its hard to be optimistic when people from all parts of the political spectrum would demand a recount. This number system would also reduce America's stress as to who would be the President of the United States when waiting for the eighteenth recount to be finished . Politicians, just a bunch of babies they are.

    • Susan Anthony

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      Jan 2 2013: Any state that enacts the proportional approach on its own would reduce its own influence. This was the most telling argument that caused Colorado voters to agree with Republican Governor Owens and to reject this proposal in November 2004 by a two-to-one margin.

      If the proportional approach were implemented by a state, on its own, it would have to allocate its electoral votes in whole numbers. If a current battleground state were to change its winner-take-all statute to a proportional method for awarding electoral votes, presidential candidates would pay less attention to that state because only one electoral vote would probably be at stake in the state.

      The proportional method also could result in third party candidates winning electoral votes that would deny either major party candidate the necessary majority vote of electors and throw the process into Congress to decide.

      If the whole-number proportional approach had been in use throughout the country in the nation’s closest recent presidential election (2000), it would not have awarded the most electoral votes to the candidate receiving the most popular votes nationwide. Instead, the result would have been a tie of 269–269 in the electoral vote, even though Al Gore led by 537,179 popular votes across the nation. The presidential election would have been thrown into Congress to decide and resulted in the election of the second-place candidate in terms of the national popular vote.

      A system in which electoral votes are divided proportionally by state would not accurately reflect the nationwide popular vote and would not make every vote equal.

      Moreover, the fractional proportional allocation approach does not assure election of the winner of the nationwide popular vote. In 2000, for example, it would have resulted in the election of the second-place candidate.

      A national popular vote is the way to make every person's vote equal and matter to their candidate.

    • Melissa Seideman

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      Jan 3 2013: Interesting idea Kiran

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