Research cited by Professors Holbein and Hillygus showed that flashier but less precise efforts, like celebrity-driven efforts to increase awareness of voting in general, dont work. It would require an Amendment in the U.S. for presidential elections. Electoral College Pros and Cons - ThoughtCo There are 538 total electors in the Electoral College, who are chosen by each state of the United States and by the District of Columbia (but not by other territories like Puerto Rico). Alternative participation. It would be wrong to assume that Hillary Clinton or Al Gore would have been president had the electoral college been abolished and elections were to be decided by popular vote. If the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact becomes law it would be an excellent first step to help get a future amendment to the Constitution to replace the Electoral College/Winner-Take-All system to elect the president with a national popular vote using Ranked Choice Voting. Our summaries and analyses are written by experts, and your questions are answered by real teachers. Encyclopdia Britannica, Inc. To access extended pro and con arguments, sources, and discussion questions about whether should use the Electoral College in presidential elections, go to ProCon.org.. After falling short in Florida, Al Gore lost to George W. Bush by five electoral votes, less than the net 18 votes Mr. Bush gained from small-state bias. I fear that most, if not all, of the states signing onto the NPV Compact will be just blue states. If the system were changed to a National Popular Vote, campaigns would shift their mobilization strategies accordingly, says Dr. Clawson. Raising voter turnout among all cohorts isnt a universal goal among the politically powerful. When a popular vote is held for a national office, the election becomes more about platform issues than local issues. The disproportionate influence of swing states (and the resulting attention given to those states) is one of the main criticisms of the winner-take-all system. Removing this system could encourage more people to come out to support their candidate. Under FPTP, a small party can win a seat with less than 40 per cent of the vote. However, some critics argue that the advantages of a direct popular election including reflecting democratic principals, outweigh the disadvantages. While amending the Constitution would be the most straightforward approach to changing the Electoral College, its also the most difficult. 5 Advantages and Disadvantages of Electoral College Many more states would still have to sign on, which doesnt look likely. Actually the NPV Compact doesnt change one word in he Constitution and in fact only changes state laws. His win made him the first President in more than 100 years to attain the White House despite a popular vote loss,2 and it led to renewed . Most young people in the United States don't vote. That doesnt mean he would have lost a popular-vote election. Leave a Comment Advantages and Disadvantages of the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact In the 2016 Presidential Election if the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact had been in effect the winner of the national popular vote, Hillary Clinton, would have become president instead of Donald Trump. But for those people who feel that changing how we elect the president should only be done by constitutional amendment they will feel that using the NPV Compact will undermine the legitimacy of the process even though its perfectly legal and constitutional. Thirty-three states legally prevent faithless electors, or electors who dont vote for the states chosen candidate. The winners would be states like Wyoming (143,000 people per electoral vote) and North Dakota (174,000 people per electoral vote).[3]. 6. And yet, electors are frequently lobbied to change their votes, with many considering the idea despite how many popular votes that candidate received. Besides DC and the 15 states that have enacted it, the bill has passed at least one chamber in nine additional states. Mayors, governors, and senators are all elected by a simple majority. Advantages and Disadvantages of the National Popular Vote Interstate Who has more power in the British government, the Queen or the Prime Minister? Advantages and disadvantages of voting systems - Today In BC And thats not how it should be in a democracy. Elected judges often feel pressure to make their decisions in accordance. That internal habit formation is reinforced externally, too, as Mark N. Franklin of Trinity College described in a book exploring aspects of voter turnout. He covers elections, polling and demographics. That means every state is allowed a minimum of 3 electoral votes. In theory we could change how we elect our president every four years. Although the 20th Amendment to the Constitution provides clarity to this situation, that process is based on the electoral college. Latest answer posted April 13, 2021 at 10:47:36 AM. It could encourage voter turnout. The last amendment, the 27th Amendment to the Constitution, was ratified nearly 200 years after it was originally proposed. The Pros and Cons of the Electoral College - SmartAsset Favors no party size in particular, though greatly improves potential for minority parties e.g., a third political party in the U.S. Instead, research points to interventions on a short, medium and long-term timeline. The electoral college encourages a two-party system and rewards candidates who have broad appeal. In contrast, in a direct popular election, each vote matters equally. In fact, he won seven of the 10 largest states, and Hillary Clinton won seven of the 12 smallest states. Of the worlds 125 electoral democracies, the US is the only one in which voters choose electors who then choose the president. How are interest groups and political parties similar or different? This redistributive process is repeated until one candidate has collected a majority of the votes. Even though we will be able to elect the president by national popular vote using the The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, eventually the rules for how we elect the president should be an official part of the Constitution. For the 7 presidential elections between 1992-2016, the Republican candidate has won the Electoral college 3 times. Also the NPV Compact allows states to withdraw from the compact as late as four months before an election. 12 Proportional Representation Pros and Cons - Vittana.org In the Electoral College, the small states are overrepresnted. Although moving to a popular vote election would balance the weight of each vote, it would also create more sway in larger population states. However, as the Constitution allows states exclusive control over awarding electoral votes, there is another option: The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact. Nevertheless, there were 7 faithless electors in 2016. But if we set politics aside and focus on what is really best for democracy in our country in the long run I believe that the advantages of using the NPV compact to elect our president outweigh the disadvantages and the best way to elect our president in the 21st century is by direct popular vote using Ranked Choice Voting. And thats not how it should be in a democracy. 2. That year, Democrats won the popular vote by disenfranchising Republican black voters and running up the score in the Deep South, where they won by 70 percent to 26 percent. Today the Democrats want to replace the Electoral College/Winner-Take-All system with a direct popular vote and the Republicans adamantly want to keep it. Does not result in a distribution of seats proportional to each party's share of the popular vote. Here is a list of the number of electoral votes for each state: In all states except Nebraska and Maine, electors are awarded on a winner-take-all basis. How does the system currently work? PR is touted to increase voter turnout in that every vote counts and voters are represented in one form or another because of their choices. [ 1] Prior to the 2016 election, there were four times in US history when a candidate won the presidency despite losing the popular vote: 1824 ( John Quincy Adams over Andrew Jackson ), 1876 ( Rutherford B. Hayes over Samuel Tilden ), 1888 ( Benjamin Harrison over Grover Cleveland ), and 2000 ( George W. Bush over Al Gore ). More people live in urban regions, which means they would have a constant sway over the election. Liberals not necessarily advantaged by switch to ranked ballot system: experts, CBC's Journalistic Standards and Practices. 2). This is rooted in the idea that the Constitution works best when it is not changed and elminating the Electoral College removes a portion of it that has been in place for some time. So California gets two electoral votes from its two senators, and much smaller Wyoming also gets two votes from its two senators. I do think that one of the disadvantages would be that there is a change in the Constitutional structure of the election of the President. But sometime in the future the popular vote will change back and lean Republican. One potential upside is increased voter turnout as more citizens believe their votes matter. Supporters of the electoral college system say that this was exactly the kind of scenarioi.e., one large state overriding the wishes of other statesthat the current system was designed to handle. If the power of a single vote were calculated in terms of number of number of people per electoral vote, states like New York (519,000 people per electoral vote) and California (508,000 people per electoral vote) would lose. The bias results from current political trends; when the system was designed over 200 years ago the situation was quite different. On average, studies show that falls in line with historical averages showing around 60 percent of eligible voters casting a vote in presidential election years. Not created due to lack of need for voting districts. Advantages of the NPV Interstate Compact 1. Should the Electoral College be abolished? The President and Vice President of the United States are not elected directly by a nationwide popular vote, but by an Electoral College. Others may struggle to meet higher than expected voter turnout levels. For example, in 1980 Ronald Reagan won just over 50 percent of the popular vote and 91 percent of the electoral vote; in 1988 George Bush received 53 percent of the popular vote and 79 percent of the . For years, a majority of Americans have opposed the Electoral College. Describe changes over time in the way the president and vice president are selected Identify the stages in the modern presidential selection process Assess the advantages and disadvantages of the Electoral College The process of electing a president every four years has evolved over time. They say that the system is undemocratic because the number of electoral votes is not directly proportional to the population of the state. The construction of the Electoral College was designed to ensure that there is some buffer between the people and the candidate. With a popular vote in place, each election win would be decreed a mandate to follow the platform of the winning party. Even the minority party wouldnt be encouraged to negotiate because they could simply stall until the next election. Another criticism is that the electoral vote system does not penalize a state for low voter turnout or for disenfranchising its citizens (such as convicted felons, or, historically, slaves and women) The state gets the same number of votes regardless of whether voter turnout is 40% or 60%. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email. Wyoming had just 3 electoral votes, but only had 255,000 voters as well. Rural voters would almost always be in the minority. 2023 eNotes.com, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Instead of a direct popular election, the United States has the Electoral College, a group of electors who represent each state's votes. Each state's delegation votes in favor of the party that has more House seats in that state. In the past, the prime minister has expressed a preference for replacing FPTP with a system in which voters rank their choices on the ballot, although he has since said he is also open to some form of proportional representation (PR). The problem is that twice since 2000, the person with the most votes didn't win. There is also an indirect opportunity cost to learning the process of voting, like finding a polling place and learning about the candidates, according to Professor Franklin. 2. There may even be "safe" states in U.S. presidential elections since most states award all electoral votes to the majority candidate. National popular vote - frequently asked questions - Common Cause Among the 24 countries we examined, the difference between youth and general turnout ranged from less than a percentage point to more than 20 points. Although this may limit the amount of diversity that occurs in office, and may generate extra financial costs, the argument could be made that these risks outweigh the results of an election where a majority of states, not a majority of people, put someone into office. All of the states now award their electoral votes based on the votes of citizens, rather than on the votes of the state legislatures, as many once did. Why should the Electoral College be abolished. Over all, 81 percent of electors are awarded by population, and 19 percent are awarded equally among the states and the District of Columbia. The debate over the Electoral College this week is familiar, but off point. It largely misses the real reason the Electoral College so often produces results counter to the majority: The winner takes all within most states. All other elections in the U.S. are through the popular vote. Smaller states are overrepresented, and states that arent swing states (like Indiana) get little to no attention from presidential and vice-presidential candidates during campaigns.. In the first round, if no candidate gets a majority, then several weeks later a runoff election between the two top finishers is held. Nate Cohn is a domestic correspondent for The Upshot. Dr. Rosalee Clawson, professor of political science at Purdue, agrees the current system is deeply flawed. A candidate can lose the popular vote but still become President 2) The Electoral College gives disproportionate weight to the small states 3) . On Dec. 14, as electors gathered across the country to cast their ballots, Joseph R. Biden Jr. had earned 306 electoral votes, 36 more than needed to win. Lower election turnout in general over time has been accompanied by a rise in other forms of citizen activism, such as mass protests, occupy movements and increased use of social media as a new platform of political engagement, according to research by the Stockholm-based International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance. That would likely reduce the number of voters who cast a ballot in each election as most people are more concerned about local impacts than national policies. People are moving to live in like-minded communities more than ever before. -, Americas electoral system gives the Republicans advantages over Democrats -, American democracys built-in bias towards rural Republicans -, How a single person could decide the election -. It was a great idea in 1787 but the country has changed since 1787 and the people today want to elect the president by a simple, direct popular vote where whoever gets the most votes wins like we do in every other election in the country. One candidate in each . The gist: electors choices should reflect the will of the people. Even factors like compulsory and weekend voting didnt reliably predict turnout in our survey. By its very nature, the Electoral College system is confusing. ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES OF ELECTORAL COLLEGE Flashcards | Quizlet Delegates convene and vote. You might imagine that people in rich, highly democratic countries are more likely to vote. And only 14 states have laws able to cancel rouge votes. For example, rapidly growing states would be at a disadvantage because electoral votes are only redistributed every ten years after the federal census. The sample of two dozen countries isnt representative of all nations. I will explain that in another blog post. Furthermore, the fact that a candidate who leads in the popular vote would not become the next president seems illegitimate on the face of it, says Dr. McCann. The strong association between youth and overall turnout suggests that measures aimed at increasing voting for everyone will bring out young voters, too and maybe even bring their participation rates closer to the general populations. 7. However, the wording is vague. When you cast your ballot, you're not actually voting directly for your favored presidential candidate. Print . 8. Since electoral votes are awarded on a winner-take-all basis, even a significant minority of contrarian votes will not make any impact on the outcome of the election. One was essentially an accident of state lines. After all, the Electoral College makes it possible that a candidate who wins the majority of the votes could still lose the election. Because its so hard to get an amendment to the Constitution passed that means that once it becomes law it will probably remain so for a long time because the bar to change it back is so high. On a close popular vote, often defined as a difference of 0.5% or less in the tabulated results, an automatic recount would likely be triggered. 9. Three Alternative Voting Methods: Pros and Cons - Giving Compass The Electoral College: Enlightened Democracy | The Heritage Foundation A winner-take-all system within states can produce results counter to the majority for no high-minded reason. Using a popular vote system, candidates could campaign regionally, targeting major areas of support, to secure enough votes to win an election. 3. The United States has a representative democracy rather than a direct democracy: Citizens elect representatives rather than voting on each bill. With time, people slowly turn from habitual nonvoters to habitual voters, as a paper by Eric Plutzer, a political scientist at Penn State, puts it. The electoral college has a number of pros and cons, depending on where you fall on the political spectrum. Almost a century ago, the political scientists Charles E. Merriam and Harold F. Gosnell identified several groups of Americans whose turnout rates were comparatively low, including young people, minorities, the less educated and the poor all of whom are still less likely to vote today. It would be a national mandate to put someone in office, even if that winning candidate received less than 50% of the vote. Its not clear that there was anything about the distribution of Mrs. Clintons support that inevitably put it at a disadvantage in a winner-take-all system. In 1888, another time there was a split between the popular vote and the Electoral College, the candidate who prevailed (Benjamin Harrison) swept the nations largest states including its largest, New York, by one percentage point. Before the 2016 election, the largest vote deficit in the popular vote was Al Gore securing over 500,000 votes more than George W. Bush. Whereas you casted your ballot, you're not actually voice directly for your favored presidential candidate. [ 2] 3. Why Don't Young People Vote? - The New York Times The populous states happen to have large urban populations that tend to be more Democratic-leaning. which currently stands at 270 votes (Kleeb par. Requires formation of some form of committee, college, or council to vote after they've been elected. Because of the state Winner-Take-All rules, which arent even part of the Constitution, they can lead to presidential elections where the winner of the election doesnt have the most popular votes. It isnt impossible to pass a Constitutional amendment, though history shows that it is not an easy process to complete. George Bush (electoral vote winner) vs. Al Gore in 2000: Al Gore won the popular vote by 543,816 votes, Benjamin Harrison (electoral vote winner) vs. Grover Cleveland in 1888, Rutherford B. Hayes (winner) vs. Samuel J. Tilden in 1876: Tiden won the popular vote by 264,292 votes, John Quincy Adams won the electoral vote in 1824 but lost the popular vote to Andrew Jackson by 44,804 votes in 1824. What would be the the disadvantages if we had a popular vote instead of Latest answer posted November 10, 2019 at 3:31:40 PM, Latest answer posted March 03, 2021 at 4:39:54 PM. The cost of a presidential election in the United States is already several billion dollars. -, Trump lost the popular vote. The Most and Least Popular Governors in America - 24/7 Wall St. Disadvantages of the Electoral College. If all the states did this, the distortions in the Electoral College system would be partly smoothed out.. Most states didnt award their electors on a winner-take-all basis in the first presidential elections, and even today there are two states that do not: Nebraska and Maine, which award some electoral votes by congressional district. Security would be improved across the country. Electors are typically chosen and nominated by the political party or the party's presidential nominee, so chances of them turning faithless is low. The Electoral College vs. Popular Vote Explained - The New York Times That is hardly a mandate for governing, though it would be taken as such. In 2016, Gary Johnson received 4.48 million votes and 0 electoral votes, but the potential is always there for this to happen. Under the electoral college system (and other voting systems not based on popular voting), it only takes one extra vote more than the other candidate to create the needed results for the election. On the other hand, if a popular vote were to be used then every single vote has an impact. While it prevents an easy-to-understand election that would draw from a popular vote, it was originally enacted to give every state its fair say in who gets elected to the highest office in the country. If this were to happen in 2020, the Republican party would get a majority and elect Trump. The Electoral College is a relic and is no longer functional in our modern democracy, says Dr. Clawson. States are awarded electoral votes based on the number of representatives in the United States House, which is essentially proportionate to a states population, and on the number of senators, which is not. In 2000 and 2016, the candidate who won the popular vote did not win the electoral college. 4. People of all ages are influenced by what they see their friends and peers doing, and older people are more likely to have observed friends making the choice to vote, over the course of multiple election cycles. Pros and Cons of Instant Runoff (Ranked Choice) Voting | MyLO Indeed, Mr. Trump did just as well in his base states call them Appalachafornia as Mrs. Clinton did in California. May also have government oversight organizations. The United States, with its 64 percent overall turnout and 46 percent youth turnout in 2016, may also fall into this category. To date, this system has allowed five men who lost the popular vote to become president Trump, George W. Bush, Benjamin Harrison, Rutherford B. Hayes, and John Quincy Adams. But for perspective, thats the only Electoral College outcome since 1876 that was within the 20 or so electoral-vote margin for the small-state bias to matter. When search suggestions are available use up and down arrows to review and enter to select. It would reduce diversity in the election structures. Accessed 28 June 2023. Who are the experts?Our certified Educators are real professors, teachers, and scholars who use their academic expertise to tackle your toughest questions. That means theres no incentive for candidates to campaign in any noncompetitive state, whether its a populous one like California or the opposite, like North Dakota. Fewer than half of Americans 18 to 29 voted in the 2016 presidential election a gap of more than 15 points compared with the overall turnout.