A long time ago, the
United States was formed, and thus, true to its name, numerous states joined into a
Union. It was quickly noticed that the states were not even, and thus there came a big dispute among how states should be represented in the
federal government, either with each state getting the same amount of say (the
Senate), or each state getting a say according to their
population (the
House of Representatives). With the delicate art of
compromise, they came up with the current system.
Why is this important to the
Electoral College? After the recent recalls in the
election of 2000 fresh in everyone's mind, there is a movement to
abolish the
electoral college, and go to a
popular vote. There are two such points made in this
debate:
- The Electoral College members can be "unfaithful": Yes, they can, but it has not happened in any meaningful event in a long time. They are meant as a check in case the people are being irrational in their state, and vote someone in that they should not. In this day of information and education, this is not needed, and all there is left is a formality.
- The Electoral College can elect someone without the consent of the popular vote. Yes, and this, I believe, is a good thing. To win the popular vote, you need to address the concerns of California, Florida, New York, and Texas... You have then won the election. You will never address the concerns of Montana, North Dakota, Vermont, or many of the other smaller states in the Union.
Regional causes (those of farmers, the California power crisis, land conservation in the Everglades), are serious issues affecting people's lives, and you cannot address them in a national forum if a politician does not visit the entire country, and try to hit at least 40 of the 50 states. The middle section of the country can outweigh New York, or Massachusetts, or Florida, and can contribute greatly to anyone's campaign, as it stands now.
To move to popular vote would mean that more broad issues may have more consensus, and that regional issues will be totally ignored, even though they affect the nation's well being. To do away with the Electoral College is to do away with the same reasoning that governs why we have a Senate and a House of Representatives. Even though there was minor outrage that G.W. Bush did not win the popular vote, he did have enough consensus of the country to make him our leader.
There is
wisdom underneath the way we run this country that allows us to continue on as we do. Too much messing with the foundation due to a one-time problem is dangerous. If there are
serious issues concerning the way the electoral process is put together, we'll solve it the right way. Large-scale
demolition of our system would do no one any good.