Abandoning the Electoral College

[Keith Broaders]

It would be a terrible mistake to abandon the Electoral College, but in order to restore our republic we must first restore the integrity of the Electoral College.

The system which was created to the tyranny of a majority now promotes it because of state-wide popularity contests and the winner take all method of allocating electoral votes.

It was not the intention of the founding fathers to have state-wide popular  elections for President. There were only 69 electors from ten states that elected George Washington and only six states even had state-wide collected popular votes,

It was not until  the election of Andrew Jackson in 1828 did all of the states except Delaware and South Carolina conduct state-wide popularity contest. In the election of 1824 only 11 of the 24 states had state-wide popular contests and only 365,833 people actually voted.

In the election of 1828  a total of 1,153,,799 popular votes were cast in 22 of the 24 states.

Instead of having 158 million largely ignorant and uninformed voters elect the President we should let 538 highly qualified electors choose our President.

The Electoral College was created to prevent a potential tyranny of a majority and  the state-wide popular elections and the winner take all system of allocating electoral votes, 

If every Congressional Districts had their own Presidential Elector every person in every Congressional District would be represented.

Due to the winner take all method of allocating electoral votes only the votes of those who voted for the candidate receiving  the most votes are counted.

The voice of the majority is heard, but the voice of the minority is ignored. According to the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment the votes of every person in every state needs to be counted equally.

The idea that an elector must vote according to the will of the majority of voters in his or her state promotes T the tyranny of the majority.

The Constitution grants to the states the authority to choose how the electors in their states shall be chosen, but does not give the state the authority to compel the electors to vote for the winner of state-wide popular vote.