Electoral
election
college
decides
Tomorrow, millions of Americans will cast their ballots for a
group of people they believe will in turn vote for the
candidate they want elected.
David Wilson, a political science professor at UT, sees a
problem with this.
“The Electoral College is obsolete, cumbersome and I think
it’s become a detriment to American democracy,” he said.
When Americans go to the polls and cast their votes for their
presidential candidate, they will actually be leaving the
choice up to a few specially selected individuals, the
Electoral College. This has been the case for more than 225
years.
“[Not many] Americans understand how the Electoral College
works,” Wilson said. The Constitution was written with
outlines for the Electoral College. Absolutely no power was
given to the common voters when choosing the president.
“In the original Constitution there is no provision for, and
no expectation of, any popular vote at all,” Wilson said.
In a report published on the Federal Election Commission’s Web
site, FEC Deputy Director William Kimberling explained the
early plans for choosing the president.
“The original idea was for the most knowledgeable and informed
individuals from each state to select the president,” he said.
Why would those in charge leave a decision that would affect
all citizens’ lives up to only these “most knowledgeable” of
people, the electors?
“The founding fathers did not trust the voters,” said David
Davis, a professor in UT’s political science department.
The lack of dependable and fast communication scared founding
fathers. They worried because voters didn’t have access to
campaign information and couldn’t make an informed decision at
the polls, Davis said.
This system didn’t last long. Things changed in the election
of 1800, as more clear-cut political parties began forming.
States no longer chose the electors. Each political party
chooses a certain number of electors for each state – the
number of state representatives and senators added together.
“Whichever candidate wins, even by a single vote, gets all the
electors,” Davis said.
If the Republican candidate won Ohio, the 20 Republican
electors would cast their vote for president. As to be
expected, these electors would most likely vote for the
Republican candidate.
This is not always the case, however.
“One of these electors could decide to … vote for someone
else,” Wilson said.
He said a man in Vermont, who was chosen as an elector for the
Republicans, plans to vote for Senator John Kerry if President
George W. Bush wins Vermont.
Even though the Electoral College has been around since the
birth of the country, Wilson and Davis said it is not
flawless.
Wilson said one of the biggest problems is “wasted votes.”
Because all the electoral votes are given to the winner –
except for Colorado, Maine and Nebraska, which have the
ability to split their electoral votes – “Any vote above 51
percent is meaningless,” he said. “Your vote counts more
depending on where you live.”
Both men agree that the major flaw in the Electoral College
system is that a candidate doesn’t have to win the popular
vote win the election.
A proposal to change the Electoral College has been made
several times to Congress. “None of them have even seen
congressional endorsement,” Wilson said.
Neither Wilson nor Davis knows if the Electoral College will
have a larger significance in tomorrow’s election than in past
elections.
“It all depends on how it happens,” Davis said, “The
Constitution has provisions for a tie.”
Tie or not, Wilson said because of recent efforts to sway
voters and deregister voters due to supposed registration
fraud, he sees nothing but disaster on the horizon.
“[Neither candidate] is going to accept defeat gracefully,” he
said. “It’s going to get very nasty.”