What is the Electoral College?
The election may be over, but we’re anticipating you’ve got questions about how the final vote took shape.
Every four years, the United States of America elects a president. But how does this actually happen? Unlike what many people envision, the president is not elected based on the amount of votes cast by citizens. While the amount of votes is important, it is not what determines the winner of the presidency.
The system the US has to elect a president is called the Electoral College. This topic became highlighted and hotly debated following the 2020 election and the insurrection on Jan. 6, 2021. But what is the electoral college and how does it work?
The Electoral College was created by the Constitutional Convention of 1787 and incorporated into the U.S. Constitution in Article I, Section 1, Clause 2. In Federalist No. 68, Alexander Hamilton outlined the thinking behind the Electoral College system and why the founders of the United States felt it was the best system to elect a president. Under the Electoral College system, electors are selected to represent each state. The number of electors per state is based on each state’s combined total of senators and representatives in order to account for the state’s population.
Following Election Day, each state’s (and the District of Columbia’s) electors assemble in order to certify the state’s vote count. For 48 of the states, as well as DC, the candidate who received the most votes receives all votes of the electors. (Nebraska and Maine have different rules.) Because of the “winner take all” nature of electoral votes, one can see why candidates focus on the so-called swing states where the number of electoral votes are essentially up for grabs.
What this translates to is a handful of states holding the keys to the White House, since the majority of the states are solidly red or blue.
Historically, on five occasions, the president and vice-president have won the majority of the Electoral College votes while not winning the popular vote. In 1876, 1888, 2000 and 2016, the Electoral College elected the president who did not win the most votes. In 1824, no candidate received a majority of the Electoral College vote setting the stage for Congress to elect a president.
Given the advances in technology and communication over the more than 200 years since the United States became a country, the underlying reasons for the Electoral College have largely been abolished. To truly enact the will of the people, all votes should matter and the president should be elected by winning the popular vote.
