The Electoral College

The Electoral College

The Electoral College

 

The Electoral College is a body of electors established by the United States Constitution, which forms every four years for the sole purpose of electing the president and vice president of the United States. This was a compromise between a popular vote by citizens and a vote in Congress. In other U.S. elections, candidates are elected directly by popular vote. The president and vice president are not elected directly by citizens. Instead, they’re chosen by “electors” through a process called the Electoral College.

 

In the EC system, each state gets a certain number of electors based on its total number of representatives in Congress. Each elector casts one electoral vote following the general election; there are a total of 538 electoral votes. The candidate that gets more than half of the votes (270) wins the election.

 

The president and vice president are not elected directly by citizens. Instead, they're chosen by “electors” through a process called the Electoral College. ... It was a compromise between a popular vote by citizens and a vote in… Share on X

 

When citizens cast their ballots for president in the popular vote, they elect a slate of electors. Electors then cast the votes that decide who becomes president of the United States. Usually, electoral votes align with the popular vote in an election.

 

The Electors

 

Instead, the election of the president of the United States is a two-step process. First, voters cast ballots on Election Day in each state. In nearly every state, the candidate who gets the most votes wins the “electoral votes” for that state, and gets that number of voters (or “electors”) in the “Electoral College.”

 

However, the popular vote is not used to determine who is elected as the nation’s president or vice president. This is because presidential elections are indirect elections; the votes cast on Election Day are not cast directly for a candidate, but for members of the EC.

 

 

The six states with the most electors are:

  • California (55)
  • Texas (38)
  • New York (29)
  • Florida (29)
  • Illinois (20)
  • Pennsylvania (20)

 

Seven least populous states:

have three electors each

  • Alaska
  • Delaware
  • Montana
  • North Dakota
  • South Dakota
  • Vermont
  • Wyoming

 

The total number of electors is 538. Each state is assigned a number of electors equal to its two Senate seats plus the number of seats in the House of Representatives. Per the 23rd Amendment, the District of Columbia is allotted three electoral votes.

 

Originally, the Electoral College provided the Constitutional Convention with a compromise between the popular election of the President and congressional selection. The 12th Amendment—ratified in 1804—changed the original process, allowing for separate ballots for determining the President and Vice President.

 

Three criticisms of the College are made:

 

  • It is “undemocratic”
  • It permits the election of a candidate who does not win the most votes
  • Its winner-takes-all approach cancels the votes of the losing candidates in each state

 

National Popular Vote Interstate Compact

 

The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact effort was started by Al Gore elector after the 2000 election, and the progressive left has invested significant resources into lobbying states to adopt the plan. After Hillary Clinton’s loss in 2016, the compact gathered even more steam.  

 

It is considered ‘undemocratic’ for a candidate to win the popular vote and not win the office of the White House. There are currently sixteen states that have come together in support of the compact and seven states who have rejected the pact. The seven states that have vetoed the pact do not wish to diminish the power of their states’ votes. These smaller states, no matter how small its population, has at least three electoral votes. The number of votes the state has is based on how many senators and representatives that state has in Congress.    

 

Larger states still have an advantage over the small states due to their number of representatives in congress. Therefore, if the smaller states adopted The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, their states’ votes would be dwarfed by the states with a larger population. 

 

The top ten most populated states in the country:

 

  1. California (Population: 39,747,267)
  2. Texas (Population: 29,087,070)
  3. Florida (Population: 21,646,155)
  4. New York (Population: 19,491,339)
  5. Pennsylvania (Population: 12,813,969)
  6. Illinois (Population: 12,700,381)
  7. Ohio (Population: 11,718,568)
  8. Georgia (Population: 10,627,767)
  9. North Carolina (Population: 10,497,741)
  10. Michigan (Population: 10,020,472)

 

The top ten least populated states in the country:

 

  1. Wyoming (Population: 572,381)
  2. Vermont (Population: 627,180)
  3. District of Columbia (Population: 711,571)
  4. Alaska (Population: 735,720)
  5. North Dakota (Population: 760,900)
  6. South Dakota (Population: 892,631)
  7. Delaware (Population: 975,033)
  8. Rhode Island (Population: 1,056,738)
  9. Montana (Population: 1,074,532)
  10. Maine (Population: 1,342,097)

 

As of summer 2019, the population of the United States is approximately 330 million. This population is distributed unevenly across all 50 states. Generally, states that are around the coasts – West Coast, East Coast, and southern states – are the most populous. States that are more interior, such as those in the Great Plains and Midwest, tend to be less populous. However, there are some exceptions, such as Illinois, which is in the Midwest but has a high population, mainly centered in the Chicago area.

 

California is by far, the most populous state in the union. It has nearly 40 million residents, which is a whopping 12% of the country’s population. If California were a country, it would have the eighth largest economy in the world and the 36th highest population!

 

Next is Texas, which has about 29 million residents; however, Texas has a growth rate of 1.34% per year, while California’s growth rate is less than half of that at 0.48%. The population in Texas has increased by over 15% since 2010! After California and Texas next is Florida, with a population of about 21.5 million. Florida is also growing quickly, with a rate of 1.63% per year.

 

On the East Coast, the most populous state is New York, which is the fourth most populous in the country. Out of a population of 20 million, about half of its residents live in New York City. States in New England, along the Northeast seaboard, tend to be quite small geographically but with higher populations. Rhode Island is the smallest state by landmass, but it has a higher population than many larger states, including Alaska (the largest state by land mass), Montana, and Wyoming. Montana, though it has a vastly larger landmass than Rhode Island, has 10,000 fewer residents.

 

The smallest state by population is Wyoming, with fewer than 600,000 residents and a negative growth rate of almost 1% per year. Other states with negative population growths include Louisiana, Connecticut, Kansas, West Virginia, Hawaii, Rhode Island, and Alaska. Surprisingly, despite the presence of the massive cities of New York City and Chicago, both New York and Illinois are experiencing negative population growth. Puerto Rico is not a state, but it is also experiencing negative population growth.