By Kael the Sapiocrat
(AN OPINION) for Brandon
I recently had a back and forth conversation via Twitter with an old college buddy of mine whom I have great respect for. Although I disagree with him on many things, he too is a fellow Sapiocrat and one I would spend hours debating with on issues of domestic and international affairs. I can't say I don't miss him since he left for graduate school, but technology has a way of keeping us close.
Okay, enough with the sappy stuff. Back to the point.
See, our discussion revolved around the age-old argument concerning the usefulness of the Electoral College. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the institution, the Electoral College is the method by which the President of the United States is chosen. While not an actual college, the institution is comprised of 538 individuals (apportioned from each state and the District of Columbia dependent upon the number of Congressional members they are entitled to) who cast their votes to ultimately decide who the next Commander-in-Chief will be. So yes, although the President is the only nationwide office, it is still not directly elected by the People. Instead, these electors are chosen by state parties comprised of party elites and directly elected politicians who represent the "establishment" or "mainstream" apparatus. Even more so, in some states, electors are bound to vote for the nominee of their party. If not, they are labeled as "faithless electors" and are shunned by the party and are subject to legal repercussions.
Kinda drowns out the whole democracy thing, right?
Now don't get me wrong, I get the whole argument that the College was created so that the Framers could protect the Presidency from the "tyranny of the majority," and that the College was the best way to ensure that those who were well engaged in civic matters would ultimately choose the leader of the nation. The institution also boosts the decision-making power of smaller states who would normally be drowned out by larger states. What Electoral College supporters will fail to tell you, however, is that the small state-large state debacle isn't the real reason why the institution was created. It was actually perpetuated by a little disagreement that occurred in the late 1700s over slavery.
Yeah. Slavery. I said it.
Remember that whole Three-Fifths Compromise thing that you learned in American history class? Remember how during this Compromise, Southern slave owners were permitted to count each slave as three-fifths of a person for political appropriation purposes? This also included determining the number of electors those Southern states were allowed to have. If the North had its way with advancing the direct election route, the North would indeed have the advantage in choosing the President because of its large voting population. However, since the Compromise counted 75 percent of the entire slave population along with the voting population of the South, this gave the region an upper hand. As a result, the South's control on the Presidency remained firm for much of the Constitution's early years. The more slaves a state had, the more electoral votes it was awarded. So not only was slavery a sick and inhumane trade, but it was just another political commodity in the early days of the American experiment.
In modern political history, the College has voted a total of five times against the nominee that was chosen by popular vote -- most recently in the 2016 election where Democratic nominee and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton won the popular vote by nearly 3 million more votes than the Electoral College-selected President Donald Trump. According to CNN, Clinton received more popular votes than any other defeated candidate in presidential history.
If you ask me, that sounds a bit more like democracy.
Surprisingly, despite the negative contingencies that surround the institution, if legislation were to circulate in the Capitol to abolish the Electoral College, I would probably not support it. At my worst, I'm an intellectual elitist (not afraid to admit it). To me, the College does not represent the aggregate will of the People. Rather, it most closely represents the will of party elites. However, I do believe that the Presidency is an institution which should be protected from the tyranny of a populace which may not possess the information needed to make a sound decision (e.g., the fake news plague). Instead, I would support a mandate which abolishes the legal repercussions on "faithless" electors and allow them to choose whom they see fit to serve as President without fear of being shunned or penalized.
Better yet, just get rid of the whole "faithless" malarkey anyway. Country before party, right?
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REFERENCES
Akhil Reed Amar. "The Troubling Reason the Electoral College Exists." Time.com. n.d. Web. 26 Apr. 2017. <http://time.com/4558510/electoral-college-history-slavery/>
Krieg, Gregory. "It's official: Clinton swamps Trump in popular vote." CNN. 21 Dec. 2016. Web. 26 Apr. 2017. <http://www.cnn.com/2016/12/21/politics/donald-trump-hillary-clinton-popular-vote-final-count/index.html>
Miller, Joe. "The Reason for the Electoral College - FactCheck.org." FactCheck.org. 11 Feb. 2008. Web. 26 Apr. 2017. <http://www.factcheck.org/2008/02/the-reason-for-the-electoral-college/>
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