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Electoral College Research Paper

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The electoral college is the process to elect a president by a votes from states. (American Government: Institutions & Policies.) Each state is given the amount of votes, to an elector, based off the number of representatives in Congress. The minimum amount of votes are three, while the maximum amount of votes are fifty-five.(The Founding Fathers; a Reform Caucus in Action) States are allowed to choose the electors in the method they see best. Most states, with the exception of Maine and Nebraska, use a ‘winner takes all’ system.("The Electoral College: Enlightened Democracy.") In this process, the candidate who won the popular election is given all of the electors of that state. Unlike the popular vote, a candidate must gain the majority …show more content…

Fear of tyranny and fear of hurting the South all were factors into the making of the electoral college. The way government in The United States is set to avoid any potential tyranny of the majority, “ Such a form of government, the Founders believed, would allow them to achieve two potentially conflicting objectives: avoiding the "tyranny of the majority" inherent in pure democratic systems, while allowing the "sense of the people" to be reflected in the new American government.”("The Electoral College: Enlightened Democracy.") The electoral college was crafted to stop the majority from ruling America. The Founders wanted democracy, but not at the cost of letting the majority rule this country. Heretofore, the idea of the electoral college and a popular vote would make all happy, people who believed in the popular vote, and people who believed letting only a certain group of people choose the president and vice president. Additionally, the electoral college was manifested out of fear of hurting the South. It was believed, especially by James Madison, that a direct vote would hurt the South: “James Madison of Virginia worried that such a system would hurt the South, which would have been outnumbered by the North in a direct election system” ("The Electoral College, Unfair From Day One.") The South would have been facing tyranny of the majority, and could not happen. The direct vote meant more votes for the North, and less for …show more content…

The process to create an amendment to repeal the Electoral College will take too long to create change, as the most common way to change the Constitution is to have two-thirds of the House to pass the proposal, and then have the Senate approve the proposal. Afterwards, it would be sent to the states for a vote, in which it must be approved by three-fourths of the states. (Some Thoughts on the Electoral College: Past, Present, and Future) This process will take too much time. Additionally, those who oppose abolishing the Electoral College will try to stop the proposal from advancing. Many politicians, believe that the Electoral College is very important to the way the leader of the country is chosen, and that it has barely any faults. In this fashion, representatives who believe in the Electoral College will not let it be destroyed. The Electoral College will never be abolished, even though it should, because the process to remove it is too time consuming, and many believe that it is an crucial part of American

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