Why the Electoral College is so Important

With another presidential election having passed, many of my friends and acquaintances are once again calling for an end to the electoral college. As I do after every presidential election, I find myself explaining why America’s Founding Fathers implemented this particular electoral system and why it is a much better choice – and, by far, a fairer choice – than using the popular vote. To my dismay, I have found that most people aren’t aware of the “why’s” and “what’s” when it comes to the Electoral College because it isn’t being taught in the majority of high schools and colleges throughout the United States. So, I thought it would be a good idea to help fill-in where the education system has failed.

What is the Electoral College and Why Do We Have It?

During the Constitutional Convention in 1787, America’s Founders debated for months about how to elect a president with some arguing that Congress should pick one and others adamant that this decision should be made by democratic popular vote. Both camps had valid concerns about each other’s wishes. Specifically, one group feared that having Congress choose the president would result in backroom deals being struck between the legislators and those who were running for the highest office in the land. The other group had three legitimate concerns about allowing the citizens to elect the president by direct popular vote: 1) they didn’t believe voters in the 18th century had the resources to be fully informed on the candidates; 2) they were concerned that undue influence from a “democratic mob” could force voters to vote a certain way; and 3) they believed that a populist president could command dangerous power.

In the end, our Founding Fathers came up with a compromise that is unique to our beloved nation – the Electoral College.  Under this compromise, a certain number of electoral votes are allocated to each state based on its representation in the House and Senate. Pretty simple, right? One of the biggest advantages to using this method is that it provides a more equal voice for both small and large states in the election of the president – since every state has two Senators no matter the size of its population. If the Electoral College were abolished, presidential candidates would be incentivized to focus most of their efforts in states like Florida or Texas, leaving smaller states like Iowa and Delaware left out in the cold.

In other words, without the balancing effect of the electoral college, a few densely populated urban areas across the country would be determining the outcome of a presidential election for all of us.  Consequently, if the electoral college is abolished or a change is made to the way electoral votes are distributed, then the wishes of rural Americans and will effectively no longer be considered. Moreover, the desire of America’s Founders to ensure the voices of all Americans and the interests of every state remain equally important would be circumvented.

Why Is It Important to Keep the Electoral College?

Aside from the fact that there are valid and practical reasons for the Electoral College system, there are other pragmatic reasons for maintaining the status quo. First of all, if we had a pure popular vote system, as many on the Left are now proposing, it would become quite difficult—because of third-party (and more) candidates—to ensure that any candidate would win a popular majority. For example, in the election of President Clinton in 1992, Clinton received a majority of electoral votes and was elected president. However, he only received a plurality – 43 percent – of the popular vote, and Ross Perot, a third-party candidate, received almost 19 percent. President Clinton did not win a majority of the popular vote in the 1996 election either, but because he won an Electoral College majority, he was elected President of the United States both times.

This raises the question: What would happen if we did away with the Electoral College and instead implemented a system whereby a person could win the presidency with a plurality of the popular vote? If this were to occur, every special interest group would have their own candidate, and the field of candidates would be enormous. Thus, EVERY election year would be utter chaos.

How could the Electoral College be undone by its opponents?

Constitutional Amendment

One way to get rid of the Electoral College system – but certainly not the easiest – is with a Constitutional amendment that’s ratified by 3/4 of states (38 of 50). Of course, it’s hard to imagine that smaller states would agree to this. The Constitution provides that an amendment may be proposed by the Congress with a 2/3 majority vote in both the House of Representatives and the Senate, or by a constitutional convention called for by 2/3 of the State legislatures.

History shows that it is certainly possible to change the method of electing a president -- we need only look at the Twelfth Amendment (1804), which mandated that electors vote separately for president and vice president; the Fourteenth Amendment (1868), which barred unpardoned rebels from becoming electors and requiring that states allow all of their male citizens over 21 years old to vote for electors; the Twenty-Third Amendment, which expanded the Electoral College to give the District of Columbia three electors in 1961; and the Fifteenth, Nineteenth, Twenty-Fourth, and Twenty-Sixth Amendments which expanded the right to vote generally, including in presidential elections.

National Popular Vote

The other way to change how America elects a president is to shift to a National Popular Vote based system where states agree to give their electoral votes to the candidate who wins the national popular vote, regardless of whether that person won the majority in each individual state. At present, 15 states and the District of Columbia have adopted the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact (NPVIC), an agreement that would award the electoral votes of all participating states within the compact to the candidate who won the national popular vote. These states, plus D.C., have 196 of the 270 electoral votes needed to give the NPVIC legal force, at least according to its terms.

It bears noting that earlier this year Virginia’s House of Delegates tried to pass legislation to adopt the NPVIC and award the Commonwealth’s electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote. While the bill didn’t pass, Senator Adam Ebbin (D-Alexandria) has reintroduced the same bill (SB 1101) again for the upcoming 2021 regular legislative session, where Democrats hold the majority in both chambers.

With that said, even if enough states were to pass the NVPIC, and the necessary 270 electoral votes were required to implement the compact, it would surely be challenged in court because it appears to be a clear violation of the Compact Clause in Article I of the U.S. Constitution.  It holds, in relevant part, that “[n]o State shall, without the Consent of Congress … enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State.” In other words, to be valid, this Compact must have the consent of Congress. In fact, several legal experts have argued that while the U.S. Supreme Court has concluded that the Compact Clause does not require Congress to consent to compacts that affect only the internal affairs of the compacting states, it has indicated in U.S. Steel Corporation v. Multistate Tax Commission that the Compact Clause requires Congress to consent to an agreement that “would enhance the political power of the member States in a way that encroaches upon the supremacy of the United States,” or “impairs the sovereign rights of non-member states.” Clearly, if this compact had the effect of nullifying the U.S. Constitution’s provisions for selecting the president, then it would be encroaching upon the supremacy of the United States. It would also involve more than merely the internal affairs of the states since it would interfere with the federalist structure of the U.S. Constitution’s method of electing a president.

The NPVIC is also in violation of Compact Clause since it would interfere with the interests of states that did not sign on to the compact by depriving such states of their ability to help determine the outcome of a presidential election on the basis of electoral votes cast individually by the states rather than collectively based upon a national popular vote. Since this would constitute a virtual elimination of the Electoral College, non-compacting states would be denied their right to otherwise participate in a constitutional amendment process to determine whether the nation should make such an important change in its method of selecting the president.

Without a doubt, this election cycle has been one of the craziest in modern times –  even surpassing the “hanging chad” debacle of 2000. However, just because this election cycle has been “different” doesn’t mean the system needs to be changed – don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater as my mother always said. The Electoral College is working exactly as the Founders intended – to ensure a president is elected by a diverse group of voters from every individual state across the United States.

Just because one side or the other doesn’t approve of the outcome doesn’t mean the Electoral College system isn’t working. We must continue to see the wisdom of our Founding Fathers, in the system of government they created, in the Constitution, and in the principles upon which this great nation was shaped.