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5 Reasons to Keep the Electoral College ...

UCLA Law Professor Daniel Lowenstein offers five arguments to maintain the Electoral College as the method for choosing the President of the United States.

----- The Electoral College was developed by our founding fathers and enshrined in the Constitution as a system of checks and balances to ensure a fair outcome in the choosing of our presidents.

However, the highly publicized 2000 presidential election, in which Al Gore may have won the popular vote but lost the contest to George W. Bush, galvanized those who wish to see the Electoral College scrapped in favor of a national popular vote.

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15 Comments

Current View: 15 / Show all Comments

importrx7 : LVL 43: VP 5: said:

importrx7

6 votes NegativePositive

64 days 20 hours ago...

Not quite what I was looking for... amplifying majority by a chosen small number? a hypothetical situation that rides down a slippery slope?

Dallaman : LVL 39: VP 4.7: said:

Dallaman

Hidden (Show Comment) -8 votes

64 days 5 hours ago...

clear your throat cocksucker
0/5

Tada : LVL 41: VP 4.9: said:

Tada

4 votes NegativePositive

61 days 5 hours ago...

Nummer three seems extremely weak if you ask me.

"We`ve elected great people as our leaders!"

...

There really nothing wrong with the system is practice, it has only failed at electing the most popular guy in the 2000 election and that was the first time out of 43 elections.

The only real problem I see is that most people think that just because you win by landslide in the electoral vote you`ve won by that number in terms of popular vote. Take Reagan and this years election as examples. Reagon won 49 states, won only by a 6% margin and Obama won by only a 5% margin. In any country using the popular vote system, they would have been considered "close calls", in the US they were epic landslides.

EckJerome : LVL 40: VP 4.8: said:

EckJerome

5 votes NegativePositive

57 days 3 hours ago...

^^ Actually, there have been three instances of the electoral college trumping the popular vote (including 2000)...and once instance of Congress trumping both.

http://www.presidentelect.org/art_evpvdisagree.html

How many people were aware that candidates are required to win more than 50% of the electoral college? If a popular third-party candidate prevents that from happening, then it`s up to the House of Representatives to decide the winner...which is how John Quincy Adams became president; a huge controversy at the time.

kyo121 : LVL 36: VP 4.4: said:

kyo121

2 votes NegativePositive

57 days 1 hour ago...

basically he just like any lawyer, he doesn`t want the common folks to do anything but elect a bunch of people who we don`t know to represent us. Sure you get to pick the electoral for your state...yeah right, how many common citizen know ANY of their electoral canidates for their states. It`s an outdated system which should`ve been disband along time ago.

Mr. Snickits : LVL 33: VP 4.2: said:

Mr. Snickits

4 votes NegativePositive

57 days ago...

importrx7 i couldnt have said it better.

Who`s to say if we got rid of the electoral college that we couldn`t impliment other laws to cope for these improbable possibilities?

I just dont see how someone could have more votes in their favor, and not win presidency?! To me that just doesnt make sense. Maybe I`m wierd for thinking this, but it just seems absolutely asinine to allow something like this to continue.

Voting for president is the last bullshit civil liberty that we as Americans posses. Most of the candidates are comming from the same cest-pool and all we have to choose is the lesser of two evils. And if I vote as a republican living in the state of Massachusettes...my vote HONESTLY DOESN`T COUNT.

oddjob458 : LVL 41: VP 4.9: said:

oddjob458

3 votes NegativePositive

56 days 23 hours ago...

Only the 4th reason sounds valid to me. It would suck to have the entire country do a recount. The other reasons sound gay to me.

Stretch2000mm : LVL 39: VP 4.7: said:

Stretch2000mm

1 votes NegativePositive

56 days 19 hours ago...

I agree with Lowenstein that the Electoral College is still relevant, but he sure makes crappy arguments. The primary reason for the electoral college is to make sparsely populated states "count" in the general election. If all you have is a national popular vote, then (for example) states like Wyoming and Vermont will have practically no bearing on any election -- elections will basically be decided by California, Texas, New York, Florida, and Illinois alone -- since combined they account for around a full third of the entire U.S. population.

Remember that one of the fundamental goals of the U.S. Constitution was to protect states` rights -- a principle that seems to have been all but forgotten in today`s political climate. In my view, the Founders meant for the federal government to be nothing more than a fabric to bind the individual states together. Today the federal government is seen by most people as the end-all-be-all and that is not how it was meant to be, nor how it should be.

The Trunk Monkey : LVL 27: VP 3.6: said:

The Trunk Monkey

1 votes NegativePositive

56 days 19 hours ago...

I think the primary reason for the electoral college is not to emphasize a popular vote as far as people are concerned, but for the states. It`s like the EU, or the UN. Each state has so many votes instead of having massive popular votes. Sometimes we forget that we live in a federal system, especially given that a lot of people identify than as an American first, and say, a Texan second. Basically, it`s built to emphasize power of the states, not the general population.

It`s a powerful argument if you`re a staunch state`s-rights advocate. I however, am a bit cynical about state`s rights after reading about past injustices perpetrated by states over the past 200+ years. But, you can`t forget the upshot. State`s can make laws that go against federal laws. Take for instance medicinal marijuana laws. I`m sure that`s a big hit for most Spiked viewers.

EDIT: Damn, beaten by stretch. Well sir, I concur.

ryanjm : LVL 28: VP 3.7: said:

ryanjm

0 votes NegativePositive

56 days 19 hours ago...

^^yes but the electoral system still allocates votes based on population, so those states still do have a huge voice in who becomes president. I think another important point is that in states like California or Texas which always go one way, it discourages votes by opposing party members because they know there`s no point. I would be interested to see the outcome of the popular vote without the electoral college.

Many of the reasons for the electoral college no longer exist. 1) Information is cheap and easy to obtain by everyone, so we all know who we`re voting for. 2) The popular vote can be counted with a reasonable degree of accuracy. 3) The party system is well established and generally either candidate is well qualified.

selfworm : LVL 43: VP 5: said:

selfworm

-2 votes NegativePositive

56 days 19 hours ago...

The only good reason was number 5, which stated simply is

"The people may chose a bad leader, so let the electoral override their selection."

kilopop19 : LVL 37: VP 4.5: said:

kilopop19

4 votes NegativePositive

56 days 18 hours ago...

the electoral college is equivalent of `under the shirt over the bra`
it just isnt the same as a direct democracy

edit:
good to know you are a philosopher LSUMD06, to bad i don`t care
Sweden has the most perfect democracy in the world, america ranks 17 on the list
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy_Index

LSUMD06 : LVL 27: VP 3.6: said:

LSUMD06

0 votes NegativePositive

56 days 17 hours ago...

^ A lot of philosophers say, and I agree, that pure democracy is a bad idea. Think about all the crazy "prop"s that get proposed every year. Something fairly benign like gay marriage actually has a LAW passed against it in California during an economic and housing meltdown because of pure democracy at work.

Having representatives, crooked as they can be, filters out the dumbest 10% or so, who would otherwise be the biggest and most easily influenced swing vote on every issue out there.

More on topic, I think the best point was regarding a close popular vote in a nationwide election. Look how big of a C-F the Florida situation was in 2000. Now imagine this: George Bush, (theoretically) running for a third term in 2008, wins by 100 votes in a nationwide popular vote election. Every state would have lawyers coming out of the woodwork, tying up (and probably bankrupting) the court system.

Frankly, real elections have only been around for about 300 years anyway. Can anyone think of one that`s worked out better than the system we`ve had? And can you think about another system that hasn`t had it`s share of controversy either?

numnums : LVL 45: VP 5: said:

numnums

0 votes NegativePositive

56 days 17 hours ago...

There is no valid point for the electoral college! It exists so that the government can get who they want in office, PERIOD! I don`t care what you think or how you want to rationalize your thoughts. Individual votes don`t count! They`re not worried about "The People" voting in someone who is going to do a bad job, they are worried that someone will get elected that won`t fill their pockets as much. The government is nothing more than a scratch my back, I`ll scratch yours system!

Valwryn : LVL 21: VP 3: said:

Valwryn

1 votes NegativePositive

56 days 14 hours ago...

Fun fact!
1 vote in Wyoming is equal to 22 votes in California.

I find his reasoning weak. His prime reiterated point is "this is so complicated and difficult and we don`t want to trouble the common man with such a daunting task, so we`ll simplify it, and take care of everything on our end."

His essential point is that the State is more important than the individuals within it... unless you`re a small state... then you`re even more important since we don`t want the anti social people to feel left out?

I just don`t get how that`s better than a popular vote, plurality wins.

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