Electoral College Changes

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On September 17, 1787, our founding fathers signed the Constitution of the United States of America, a document designed to prevent the failure of the newly created republic by establishing a governmental balance of power with policies to ensure that the United States had a government by the people, for the people. Within the Constitution, they included an elector based system to elect the two highest offices in the country -- the president and vice president. Since the signing of the Constitution, the document has been amended and the nation has gone through major changes. Few items on the constitution remain unchanged, but one of those is the basis of the Electoral College. Since the Electoral College’s beginnings, America has changed, and …show more content…
The idea was like the House of Representatives, the smaller states still get members (a vote), but larger states still get more pull. This was done because if the election in 1780’s was done based on strictly popular vote, New York would have won just because they had more people -- white men -- who could vote. To level the playing field, the Electoral College was formed, with these three safe guards built in: the favorite sons rule, two ballot system, and the Three Fifths Compromise. The Founding Fathers wanted to ensure one state would not rule over all, so the Favorite Sons Rule was created to combat it. The language implies that one state cannot nominate a president and vice president with the same home state. Like the Second Amendment, the wording and the Founding Fathers’ intentions are not completely clear, and one modern party has taken advantage of that. In 2000, President George W. Bush (from Texas) picked his running mate Vice President Dick Cheney (from Texas) and the were nominated by Republicans (in Texas) for the Republican Party’s nomination. When they won, it gave the state of Texas a large amount of power in the federal government with thirty-six congressmen and the President and Vice President (Black). Cheney did get off with the technicality that he was a registered voter in Wyoming, but he was residing in Texas at the time of his …show more content…
One discrepancy between the states are “winner take all” states versus “split electors.” In “winner take all” states, like Illinois, the popular vote decides the direction of the electors. People -- in Illinois’ case downstate republicans -- within those states believe that their votes do not matter, and they do not. Maine and Nebraska have “split electors,” which means that two electors go in favor of the overall popular vote winner, and districts -- two in Maine and three in Nebraska -- vote for an elector. So in 2016, Hillary Clinton will probably receive two electors for the popular vote, and one for one the districts, and Donald Trump will get one from the other districts in Maine. This system provides an arguably more fair representation of the populus (270). With this system, Illinois would have their electors split like this: Hillary Clinton carries two for popular vote, and eleven for each congressional district, and Donald Trump would get seven for the districts he won (Nir). This would made the electors split thirteen to seven, instead of twenty to zero. This system would make it more fair for the rural Illinoisans’ conservative votes which is always counteracted and overwhelmed by metropolitan illinoisans’ votes. Another discrepancy between states is how states treat faithless electors, or
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