Flunk the Electoral College: Getting Rid of the Exploding Cigar of American Politics

By Michael Waldman, Brennan Center for Justice. Posted June 12, 2008.

It was the end of the long, sweltering summer at the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia. Delegates were anxious to finish, but a big question remained: How would the new office of president be filled? One delegate wanted Congress to choose. Another wanted a popular election; that idea was overwhelmingly voted down. It would be "unnatural," warned one foe. Southern states had extra representation in Congress because slaves were counted in the population, under the grand compromise that allowed the Constitution to move forward; a popular vote would wipe out that advantage, since slaves don't vote.

The delegates referred the mess to the Committee of Detail, which wrote a draft of the Constitution with the Electoral College as a rather convoluted solution. The states would each choose electors, with one electoral vote per senator and House member. That way small states, especially slave states, would have extra clout. If no one got an electoral vote majority, the House of Representatives would decide. Anyway, everyone knew George Washington would be the first president. With a shrug, the founding fathers moved on to other matters.

The Electoral College is the exploding cigar of American politics. Four times, the candidate who won fewer votes nonetheless has become president. (Political scientists, with rare concision, call this the "wrong winner" problem.) In 1824, Andrew Jackson won the most total votes, but not enough states to win the Electoral College. The House of Representatives picked John Quincy Adams instead, after a bitterly alleged "corrupt bargain" with another candidate. Then, in 1876, Democrat Samuel J. Tilden won more votes than Republican Rutherford B. Hayes, but not an Electoral College majority. The deadlocked election went to Congress. The deal: Republicans got the White House, but Democrats got federal troops pulled out of the South, ending Reconstruction and ushering in 90 years of repression against the former slaves and their descendants. In 1888, Benjamin Harrison lost the popular vote but won the Electoral College.

And in 2000, Al Gore got half a million votes more than George W. Bush, a wider popular vote margin than John F. Kennedy had to best Richard Nixon -- but with Florida, Bush won the Electoral College, 271-266.

Near misses are even more common. In 2004, Bush won the popular vote, but a switch of 60,000 in Ohio would have elected John Kerry. In 1976, the election would have been thrown into the House of Representatives with the shift of a few thousand votes in Delaware and Ohio. Any race could turn on such a fluke. And when the House chooses, each state gets one vote, giving empty Idaho the same say as crowded California. Massive pressure would push lawmakers to back the candidate of their party, not the voters. The resulting political fracas would dwarf anything seen in a century.

All that is true in a year when the system doesn't work -- when the runner-up gets the gold medal. But the truth is, the Electoral College warps competition and subverts political equality even when it does work.

Because most states are reliably "red" or "blue," candidates focus nearly all their efforts on a few "swing" states. As a result, many voters never see a campaign ad, receive more than a perfunctory candidate visit, or experience the mass mobilization and get-out-the-vote fervor of a real campaign. As late as 1976, 40 states were tightly contested, including all the big ones. More recently, though, only about 17 states were in play by November. As Business Week notes, "The corn farmer living in Iowa (one of the Sweet Seventeen) is coveted by both parties and showered with goodies such as ethanol subsidies. But just next door, the wheat grower in Republican South Dakota is insignificant to presidential candidates. Ditto the hog farmer in Nebraska, the potato grower in Idaho, and the rancher in Oklahoma."

See more stories tagged with: electoral college, democracy, elections, election reform, voting rights, national popular vote, constitution

Michael Waldman is the executive director of the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law, a think tank and advocacy organization focusing on democracy. He was the chief speech writer for President Bill Clinton from 1995 to 1999.

Liked this story? Get top stories in your inbox each week from Rights and Liberties! Sign up now »