The Electoral College

Occasionally presidents win the electoral vote but not the popular vote. It has happened four times before (1876, 1888, 1824, and 2000 with Bush-Gore) and looks likely to happen again in this election. That will no doubt bring up again calls to abolish the Electoral College by journalists who have a less than complete understanding of American history. (PS - I’ve just seen the first such article pop up)

When the founders of the nation were putting together the Constitution, one of the major issues they faced was the worry of the smaller states, like Delaware, that they would always be overpowered and outvoted by the larger states, like Virginia. The solution, or compromise, was to create two chambers in Congress, the House with representation (roughly) proportional to the population of each state, and the Senate where each state got exactly two representatives, irrespective of size or population.

In essence the Electoral College addresses that same issue. States with smaller populations get slightly proportionally more electoral votes than larger, more populous states. That means that elections aren’t always just decided by California and New York, with the largest populations and the largest cities. The smaller, less populated portions of the nation get a say as well, as they should in a democracy.

Liberal urban voters (like the journalists who will push to eliminate the Electoral College) would not be happy if their elections were always settled by conservative rural voters, so they need to understand that those conservative rural voters would be equally unhappy (for equally valid reasons) if elections were always settled by a few big states and big cities.

The essential problem with democracy is to ensure that it doesn’t just become mob rule by the majority, and that the rights and views of the minorities are also heard and respected. Direct election by the majority of the popular vote sounds like a good idea, but it would tend to destroy one of the essential features of America – the recognition and protection of a wide diversity of views and needs across many states. It would become the tyranny of the majority – mostly urban dwellers in a few big cities in a few large states.