<p>[NJ</a> gov. signs popular vote measure - Yahoo! News](<a href=“http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080114/ap_on_re_us/popular_vote]NJ”>http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080114/ap_on_re_us/popular_vote)</p>
<p>I could understand why the Electoral College was needed before the age of mass communication, but can anyone give a good reason why it is still in the best interest of the country today?</p>
<p>Personally I would be happy to see it go.</p>
<p>I’ll give you a really good reason. If I was running for president and it was all based on the popular vote and NOT the electoral college; I would spend my money on campaigning in New York, California, Florida, and Texas. I would spend everything I had in those 4 places. If I got the vast majority of the states to love me and vote for me, I could tell the rest of the country to screw off. In the entire country for the 2004 election, approximately 120 million people voted. That’s almost 1/3 of the population. And for what it’s worth, that was a pretty good turn out. In the 4 states I mentioned above, there are 97 million people.</p>
<p>Even if I couldn’t get all the people to vote; and to vote for me; you can see the problem. Basically, pick and choose where most of the people are and campaign there. Just about all midwest and rocky mountain states would be forgotten. With the exception of the large cities like Detroit, pittsburg, chicago, etc… the rest of the state would be left out to dry. New york is a prime example. Campaign New York City. Mostly democrats. Mostly liberal. Half of the entire population of the state is in 1 city. Why would I campaign in the rest of the state.</p>
<p>The electoral college was not established solely for the benefit of efficiently voting because of a lack of mass communications. It was also established as a means where the president was indeed representing the entire country. You can lose New York and make up for it with vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine. You can lose California and make up for it with Colorado, Wyoming, Montana, and the Dakotas. You can’t make up for it solely on population, but with the electoral college you don’t penalize the farmers in Nebraska, Kansas, etc… because the large population is in the urban cities.</p>
<p>Anyway, there are a lot of good reasons we have the electoral college. There’s also a lot of good reasons that our country is a Republic and NOT a Democracy. (Although, too many people think we are a democracy. We aren’t). Remember that little tidbit … and to the REPUBLIC for which it stands… Through the democratic process we elect REPRESENTATIVES. They in turn, we entrust, to make laws and bills that are for the common good of all and not a particular class of people. Sometimes the MAJORITY is NOT the right answer.</p>
<p>The Electoral College gives disproportionate weight to voters in small rural states. Therefore the Republican party will never go along with abolishing it. Therefore it’s not worth wasting time discussing…we’re stuck with it as it is.
It’s not “fair” but much in life isn’t. Next case.</p>
<p>TheDad; you are correct that the electoral college gives a disproportionate weight to voters in rural states, but that’s only if compared to the popular vote. When you conside that many of these “rural” states also provide a disproportionate influence on the country; such as agriculture, mining, oil, ranching, tourism, etc… The electoral college becomes a needed balance. Without it, you would have large amounts of urban voters deciding on matters that affect the entire country, yet they know absolutely nothing about and emotionally aren’t affected directly. Therefor, their votes and position would be disproportionate and not good for the country as a whole.</p>
<p>It’s not like everyone can live in an urban style state and use the rest of the states as a resource for food and other resources. Our country is too vast. It’s not like you can live in California and commute to work in Idaho. But you are incorrect that the “disproportionate” weight isn’t fair. The electoral votes given to a state are based on population. So, the weight of each state is balanced based on population. But, if you win California, you’d have to win a considerable number of other states to compensate. The point is; it is possible to have combined votes in 5 or more states even out the votes of 1 state. Without the electoral college, there would be no interest whatsoever in visiting or being concerned with any state but the big 5. Even though, the majority of the non big 5 states affects the entire country’s survival.</p>
<p>Here’s a link to how many electoral votes are given for each state. It’s quite proportionate to the population. But at least with the electoral college, candidates have to be concerned with the entire country and not just the big 5 that have most of the people but don’t contribute proportionately to the entire country as the other less populated do. (The big 5 needs the rest of the country MORE than the rest of the country needs the big 5). Well, except we wouldn’t have “Harry Potter”, and 3 of the big 5 are our biggest source of illegal immigrants. We need them too I guess.</p>
<p>[United</a> States Electoral College - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._Electoral_College]United”>United States Electoral College - Wikipedia)</p>
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<p>Not quite, my city-bashing friend. Electoral votes are based on population (House seats)+ 2 Senate seats. That plus 2 skews it towards less populous states. </p>
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<p>Sonme of that sounds ignorant? AGRICULTURE? California is the largest state and has one of the strongest agriculture economies? Tourism? I think more people are interested in Los Angeles or New York than Boise or Billings.</p>
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<p>Twelve of the 13 smallest states are almost totally ignored in presidential elections because they are politically non-competitive. … Although it is sometimes conjectured that a national popular election would focus only on big cities, it is clear that this would not be the case. Evidence as to how a nationwide presidential campaign would be run can be found by examining the way presidential candidates currently campaign inside battleground states. Inside Ohio or Florida, the big cities do not receive all the attention, and they certainly do not control the outcome. Because every vote is equal inside Ohio or Florida, presidential candidates avidly seek out voters in small, medium, and large towns.</p>
<p>“I could understand why the Electoral College was needed before the age of mass communication, but can anyone give a good reason why it is still in the best interest of the country today?”</p>
<p>Got something against the Constitution, or are you only a strict constructionist when it suits you?</p>
<p>Unfair??? </p>
<p>I guess we should just let the progressives in NY and Cal, determine who becomes President.</p>
<p>I like the idea of each person’s vote counting equally whether they live in Den of Iniquity, Left Coast or Broken Condom, Heartland. A quaint notion. </p>
<p>CC, as GTLU points out, it’s the +2 that is the killer on electoral votes and makes it decidedly <em>not</em> proportional to population. The +2 for Wyoming is 200 percent bonus, the +2 for California is slightly under a 4 percent bonus.</p>
<p>The argument of who needs whom is specious. The hard truth is that the EC gives greater weight to voters in states that are predominantly white and rural/small town, thus inherently more conservative. </p>
<p>There actually is a move afoot in a number of states to give their electoral votes to the candidate winning the popular vote nationally. A second state just passed its law, which takes effect when a number of states representing 270 or more EV’s passes the same law. It doesn’t abolish the EC, it just does an end around. States like Wyoming and the Dakotas will be the dead-enders.</p>
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<p>Ah, the sterotypes have no end. Gore beat Bush by 12 percent in California. In Nebraska Bush beat Gore by 30 percent, in Montana by 24 percent, in Idaho by 31 percent, and in Utah by 41 percent! So I guess Republican states are way farther to the right than California is to the left. </p>
<pre><code>Either way, although California has loads of votes , it doesn’t go 90 percent either way to destroy the effect of other states.
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<p>The whole purpose of the 2 senate seats per state was to be a check and balance to the representatives that are based on population. Thus; a law couldn’t be railroaded from the house to the senate and become law because California or New York wanted it. By having 2 senators for each state, it forces any bill leaving the house to be looked at in relationship to the country and not how it affects a particularly populated states.</p>
<p>For what it’s worth; I was born and raised in the New York City area. I am not bashing “Big City”. Nor am I ignorant of it. I don’t think the plus 2, which gives wyoming 3 electoral votes that much of a disproportionate advantage over California and their 55 electoral votes. Yes, it may not seem proportionate, but our entire political system is set up on checks and balances. California has 1/8th of the US’s population, but they shouldn’t have 1/8th of all the say so in the laws and policies that affect the entire country. Believe it or not, most people in the country don’t want to live in California. Nor should the other 7/8th of the population tell california how they have to live. </p>
<p>We are 50 independent states with 50 independent constitutions. Our country doesn’t revolve around just California. Fortunately we have the political, legal, and judicial system that we have in order to create a balance of power and check and balance between those that look at bills and laws strictly out of emotion, and actually making it a law that affects everyone. If anything, the “Federal” government has gotten way to involved in making laws and policies. The majority of laws should be left to the individual states. Not federal laws. As far as voting for president; which is the electoral college; it is needed. Even as far as California goes, most voting is done in the LA area. I also disagree with the statement that political candidates don’t visit the smaller states. That just isn’t true. During the primaries, many of the smallest states are visited a lot by the candidates. Even places like Wyoming.</p>
<p>UCLA and TheDad; you’ve obviously got a problem with “Conservatives”. That’s OK. That’s also part of the balance. If the entire country was left wing liberal our country would have rotted away many years ago. On the other hand, if it was all conservatives, we would be deprived of much of the arts and environmentalists. That too isn’t good. Both sides keep the balance in check. The difference is; as a conservative I understand the importance of both sides and recognize the need to work together. Liberals tend to continue to fight their cause and don’t like compromises. Yet, that is so hypocritical as a philosophy considering how in the 60’s and such, it was the liberals promoting everyone being allowed to do their own thing. Now that they’ve grown up and most have realized the “Real” world, their attitudes have changed.</p>
<p>Gores 12 percent win in California equated to more votes than all the other states you mentioned combined.</p>
<p>The argument for 2 Senate seats per state, affecting legislation, is different than giving the voters of small states a magnified effect in elections. Eliminating the EC wouldn’t affect checks and balances at all.</p>
<p>I also disagree with a couple of other points in CC’s post but they’re tangential for the moment…but I do not stipulate to them.</p>
<p>N.B., CC: I did not have such a huge problem with conservatives until the Bush administration. Things would swing back and forth and that’s the way it went. Now, my attitude toward the would-be ayahtollahs and the neocon thugs is that of Rome towards Carthage at the end of the Third Punic War. So shall you reap as ye have sown.</p>
<p>JCoop: Yes, and if you added up the smallest states until they tallied 55 EV’s, their population would be much much less than California. But I guess it’s okay if it’s not your Gore being oxed.</p>
<p>Especially if that ox is Gore!</p>
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<p>No it isn’t.</p>
<p>People are throwing around facts without knowing what they are.</p>
<p>Population of South Dakota: 755,000
Electoral Votes: 3</p>
<p>Population of Oregon: 3,430,000
Electoral Votes: 7</p>
<p>Population of California: 38,000,000
Electoral Votes: 55</p>
<p>A South Dakotan’s vote is worth 1.94 votes from Oregonians, and 2.74 votes from Californians. That’s huge. Actually, it’s even bigger than I expected it to be before I ran these numbers.</p>
<p>Yes, 7/8 of the country doesn’t live in California, but 99.04% of the country (I ran these numbers too) does not live in South Dakota, North Dakota, Montana, or Wyoming, and these states give us 2.06% of the electoral votes. They have over double their true distribution. Say what you will about whether or not the electoral college is needed. As far as mathematical proportions, it is a JOKE.</p>
<p>The Constitution was set up to represent the united States in a federated government. The President is chosen to be the executive branch of that federal government, representing the various States, and their people, in the execution of the obligations of that government. The House and Senate were the famous result of the tension between the desire of the small states not to be swallowed up by the voice of the big populations of Virginia, Pennsylvania, New York, and Massachusetts and of the populations of the big states not to lose the relatively bigger voice of their larger populations.</p>
<p>The voice of the people in the federal legislature is a blend of states and population. The writers of the Constitution reached the same compromise in selecting the administrator of the government. I’m perfectly happy with that compromise.</p>
<p>Changing the Constitution because you don’t like the current leadership of a political party is short-sighted and kind of bizarre. I don’t get it.</p>
<p>My last question is, that if the Electoral College is so bad, when should we ditch the bicameral legislature in favor of a direct-representation parliament? I’m not looking forward to Americans learning of the painful compromises inherent in coalition governments.</p>
<p>The big government party (Democrats) would almost never lose an election in a popular vote. All they’d have to do was make sure all their government spending was done in New York, LA, Chicago, Philadelphia, San Diego, and Dallas. And they’d have to make sure all their government jobs were located in those cities. Do those 2 things, and every big city in America votes Democrat for local economic reasons.</p>
<p>WashDad, abolishing the EC does <em>nothing</em> to erode the checks and balances inherent in equal representation for all states in the Senate. That’s a red herring. And our electoral system has been changed significantly several times, with direct election of Senators (and why not the President?), women getting the vote, and fairly stringent…for all that the current party in power likes to find back-door ways to subvert these protections…safeguards that neither property nor other economic standards be used as a barrier to franchise. [And I realize that even conjuring the image of a system where only men with property get to vote induces near orgasm in some people even today.]</p>
<p>And having direct elections for President also has nothing to do with separate elections for the national legislature, bi-cameral or not. Also, we have discrete single-member House districts, which mitigates heavily against the prospects of multi-party abominations like those of Italy, Israel, (what is it with countries beginning with “I”?), etc. Again, you’re raising red herrings that have nothing to do with the EC.</p>
<p>BTH, I have to run off to dinner and a client meeting otherwise I’d Google and do it myself, but starting with the smallest states and working up, what’s the population of the states you have to put together to match California’s 55 EV’s?</p>
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And which, exactly, is the small government party?</p>