Should the United States get rid of the Electoral College?

[Jayhawker Soule]

It wouldn't really matter. Trump won the PV and look how many in this forum are already saying American people are basically stupid/ignorant.

Many only suggest that about those who claim that eliminating the Electoral College wouldn't really matter.

 

[We Never Know]

Many only suggest that about those who claim that eliminating the Electoral College wouldn't really matter.

Aw. Are you needing attention again?
I bet your cat even ignores you lol

 

[Koldo]

The US is a union of states, why would the smaller states agree that they should play by new rules that make them insignificant?

There should be a change in the voting system to break the duopoly though.

Also lots of federal power should be returned to the states. This would make the Presidential election far less consequential and divisive, and more people would have the kind of governance that best represents their values.

The problem is not really the EC, but the winner takes all nature so one half "loses" and grows bitter while the other "wins" and gloats until the tables are turned.

That still happens at States level though. It is the nature of democracy.

 

[Evangelicalhumanist]

What makes you think we have it?

And this doesn't describe the system you have today:



Hamilton is describing something akin to a College of Cardinals, not representatives sent with marching orders to only vote one particular way.

And this:



... Is better served by selection by nationwide popular vote than by the EC. If we want to put the power to select the President in the hands of the people, this is better served by going straight to the people instead of distorting their will with an intermediate step.

That's how I read it, too. After all, it can't be any easier to select "men most capable of analyzing the qualities adapted to the station, and acting under circumstances favorable to deliberation, and to a judicious combination of all the reasons and inducements which were proper to govern their choice" than it is to just select the damn President yourself.

 

[Evangelicalhumanist]

And some do not.That fact of the matter is that those who benefit from the Electoral College have the power to resist efforts to eradicate it.

Read the Wikipedia entry ...

No need to read it -- I understand that part completely. That is why I offered the third option in the poll.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

That's how I read it, too. After all, it can't be any easier to select "men most capable of analyzing the qualities adapted to the station, and acting under circumstances favorable to deliberation, and to a judicious combination of all the reasons and inducements which were proper to govern their choice" than it is to just select the damn President yourself.

Like I touched on earlier, I think it's a reasonable approach when information moves at the speed of a horse.

If you get to DC and find out that the state's preferred candidate died, say, then there's probably no time to communicate this back to the legislature and get new orders. Autonomy helps to make sure that the state gets represented in some way.

 

[Augustus]

This is what I find. I am a huge fan of multi-party coalitions, because they require larger (but not majority) parties to work with other parties with different priorities. This has the effect, in my view, of incorporating broader public viewpoints into public decision-making, which can hardly be a bad thing -- well, at least for those who really do like the notion of democracy.

Many democracies are currently or recently governed by coaltions, including Armenia, Australia, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Germany and more.

Although they can give disproportionate power to minority parties, including the more extreme ones. For all its faults FPTP systems are less susceptible to the extremes and "populism" (I know you are not strictly talking about PR, but it makes coalitions the norm).

In addition Pr systems allow stagnant parties who can reliably pull in 10-20% of the vote to keep floating along indefinitely. Rule by horse trading is also not really an ideal system, and frequently leads to political impasses.

There are certainly arguments in favour, and it may overall be a slightly better (or less bad) system, it just creates different kinds of problems that many people underestimate (not necessarily you).

 

[Evangelicalhumanist]

There are certainly arguments in favour, and it may overall be a slightly better (or less bad) system, it just creates different kinds of problems that many people underestimate (not necessarily you).

Thanks for the modest vote of confidence, but I can be misguided, too.

But I couldn't help notice your comment about "different kinds of problems." Well, one of those is that we are all human, we have our own talents, foibles, notions, misconceptions -- and we're trying to live together. Just being "us" is a problem -- and it's probably, today, our most basic problem. So one way or another, we're sort of going to have to figure out how to cope with it.