POLI-330N Week 4 Discussion: The Electoral College Argument, Politics and Social Media (Option 2)

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Option 2. The founding fathers of this country feared putting the power to elect our president directly into the hands of average undereducated people. they also feared Majority rule, The electoral c... ollege was set up as a way to control these issues that the framers had, and also as a form of compromise (D. M. West, 2020) with electors being based on the total number of senators and representatives. As we started moving into more modern times the process has become more democratic with state legislatures stopping the picking of presidential electors themselves, and instead allowing for a popular vote with most pledging to follow the popular vote. ((Greenburg, et. al., 2020, p. 266) Our country has used this method of electing a president for hundreds of years. But there are some issues with it. According to ProCon.org One problem is that it gives too much power to swing states, states that can vote either democrat or republican. Making them the main focus of candidates instead of states that they know primarily how they will vote. Another is that many feel that democracy should function on the will of the people, and that all each person should be counted as 1 vote, giving rise to the notion of the winner of the election being whoever wins the popular vote. But the popular vote way can lead to more issues if it's a close race for the popular vote and each candidate or party wanting a recount if they would lose and so on. Many would then state that a way around this is for each state to have the same number of votes, no matter the population for California having 55 electoral votes, while Wyoming only has 3 (2020 Electoral College Results, 2021), gives California a lot more power and an incentive to open their gates to immigration to help get even more electoral votes. But if we would give each state the same number of votes then people from more populous states would feel like their vote didn't matter. So ultimately should we abolish the Electoral College. In my opinion no, for yes, it's not a perfect system and does have minor flaws. But it still is one of the best ways to move voting equal for each state, and to prevent a majority or mob rule in which states like California would decide everything for the rest of the county. So, the Electoral College system was the best form for a stable compromise on electing a president our founding fathers could come up with, and honestly, I don't think anyone could come up with something better. Pros of the electoral system is that it helps stop recalls, and runoffs giving a certainty to elections, It also allows the minority not to be overwhelmed by the majority, allowing a candidate to win the election by having more states voting for them than just states with a large population. References Greenburg, E. S., Page, B. I., Doherty, D., Minkoff, S. L., & Ryan, J. M. (2020). The Struggle for Democracy: 2018 elections and updates edition (12th ed.). New York:Pearson. ProCon.org. (2022, January 27). The Electoral College: Top 3 Pros and Cons. https://www.procon.org/headlines/electoral-college-pros-cons-procon-org/ West, D. M. (2020, March 13). It’s time to abolish the Electoral College. Brookings. https://www.brookings.edu/policy2020/bigideas/its-time-to-abolish-the- electoral-college/ (Links to an external site.) 2020 Electoral College Results. (2021, April 16). National Archives. https://www.archives.gov/electoral-college/2020 [Show More]

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