New and Old electoral college system

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So I'm writing a research paper in Englsh class about a subject that I thought I should post here

The Electoral college of the US, as established by the 12th amendment of the Constitution, (in my opinion silly and flawed, but ALSO) completely different from the electoral college system set by the founding fathers in the original government blue print.

the old system works like this.

The common man is not very politically savvy, or at the very least, really only cares about a few issues and couln't care less about how implementing the solutions to his issue would effect other issues. They also distrusted the popular vote concept, and they were absolutely terrified of the election of a president who oly looking out for regional interests instead of national ones.

thier system worked like this.

common citizens would vote not on the president, but on the electors, intellectuals and politically savvy people, who would then vote in thier state capitals all across the country for any individuals believed to be the right choice. The electors were still proportional to the state's pop. though

if the vote was a tie, then the president would be chosen by the house of representatives, which was THE ONLY branch of government to be elected via popular vote in the original system.

the founding fathers designed no place in their system for political parties, which immediately began to form as soon as president washington left offfice after distributing his farewell speech, which ironically, devoted a large section towards warning against "the Spirit of Party" he argues that no alliance, no matter how strong, is an adequate substitute for complete and total unity of purpose. All alliances can have rough patches (Republicans: democrats are morally corrupt socialists!! !! ! Democrats: Republicans are corporate bootlickers who hate the poor!! !!)

the biggest (and in my opinion, only) flaw in the old system, is that their is no tickets. This means that two people of radically differing views can be president and vice president.

actually over the course of my research, I have come to the conclusion that the pledge of allegiance is wrong. "and to the republic, for which it stands...." America is not really a republic (in the sense that it was intended to be, anyway) anymore. It's certainly not a direct democrasy, but I'm pretty sure its not quite arepublic.

What leads you to the conclusion that the United States is not a republic?

While you might properly question whether or not the United States has a democratic form of government, it seems patently obvious that you have a republican form of government. You might be trending toward becoming a plutocratic republic, but that does not invalidate the use of the noun.

As an outside observer, the most interesting thing to me about the electoral college system is the degree to which it allows political parties to render much of the country irrelevant. The practice of awarding all of a states electors to a single candidate (other than Maine and Nebraska, who hardly matter--see below) the real advantage is that political parties can ignore the states whose votes are a foregone conclusion. Which mean that the only voters in the United States who matter, in a presidential election, are the voters in the swing states. And that is reflected in the amount of time, money and effort that is spent in those states.

The OP failed to explain wtf he's talking about.
So that prompted me to research it- and- caused me to stumble upon an issue- a potential earth shaking constitutional crises that could shake our nation to its core!


Every President in the 20th centurey has been elected in violation of the constitution- except Richard Nixon (and that was by dumb luck).

What the OP describes as 'the old system" is exactly what we still have. You didnt explain how the two systems differ.

The 1803 amendment to the constitution made one major change.

In the original system the state electors voted for the president, and not for the vice president. The guy with most votes became presidnet- the second most popular guy got to be vice president.

This created all kinds of problems in the first two elections.

So they changed it so the electors casted a vote for the office of president, and second vote expressly for a man for vice president.

In theory- its still different from how we regular voters vote. They dont vote for "the ticket" - the package deal offered by the Party of President and veep together- but seperately for president and for vice president. But in practice it works out the same way we voters vote.

But I uncovered something interesting.

In both the original system (in the constitution) and in the 1803 revised system that we still use- the electors cannot vote for "a native son". The electors cannot vote for a person from their own state. Which means a presidential candidate is not allowed by the constitution to get the electorial votes from his native state. Those electors have to either vote against him, or (presumabley) they have to abstain from voting at all.

In my life time I know of only one major party Presidential Candidate ( even when they lost the national electon) who failed to get his own native state's electorial votes. That being George McGovern in the 1972 election- who lost his native South Dakota to Nixon.

If the state's populace votes for you- you get their electorial votes.
And even the losers in the race for the whitehouse almost always get the popular (and therefor electorial) votes from their native states.

Obama got Illinois, McCain got Arizona, Clinton always got Arkansas, Reagan depended on California, and Carter twice got Georgia (even when the rest of the deep south left him for Reagan), Johnson got Texas, and even Goldwater got Arizona.

Ive never heard of a state obstaining because the candidate was their native son.

Apparently some Texas voters did actually sue because the Texas electorial college voted for Bush, and for Cheney, in the 2000 presidential race. Bush was state govenor, and Cheney was an on and off again texas resident. But the case was thrown out of court.

So virtually every President of the 20th centurey has been elected in violation of the constitution because they ignore this "native son" rule!

I think that the OP should take this up, and take it to the Supreme Court!

Natural plastic, If you think I didnt have a good explaination, don't say the OP "didn't know wtf I was talking about." Furthermore, you are inccorrect. The 12th amendment is an almost complete revamp of the electoral system, and it did effect the native son clause.

the text reads

"The Electors shall meet in their respective states, and vote by ballot for President and Vice-President, one of whom, at least, shall not be an inhabitant of the same state with themselves"

this means that as long as both candidates don't come from the same state, their good.

Even I, a non-American, know that you are incorrect in your supposition.

Electors are obliged to cast at least one of their votes for a person who is not a resident of the same state, but that vote can be for either a President or for a Vice-president. Which is one of the reasons why parties ensure that their nominees choose running mates from different states, so that every state's electors can vote for both of them.

I didnt mean you didnt know what you're talking about. I meant that the reader doesnt know what point you're making- or what question you're asking- or what response you're looking for. Specifically - you describe the old system but dont say how it differs from the later system. Which is why I went to wicki

Ok - so one guy CAN be from your state- as long as the other guy isnt.

I guess I didnt read wiki closely enough.

My bad.

In the old system the President was an unimportant figure head. Congress, divided by representatives of the states (the Senate) and the people (Representatives) had most of the say-so, and only on matters clearly delineated by the Constitution.

In the new system the President is a dictatorial tyrant.

There's your difference.

Do you see popular participation in government as a bad thing then?

President George Washington associated with the Federalist faction in early U.S. politics even though he never formally declared himself to be a member of the Federalist Party.

The Constitution is specifically designed to prevent "complete and total unity of purpose." If that were the intention, we would have a monarchy! Governmental authority is instead divided in myriad ways: between the federal government, the states, and individual persons; between the executive, legislative, and judiciary branches of government; etc. In the U.S. Supreme Court, we have nine justices instead of just one. Congress is divided into two chambers, and each chamber has a number of deputies. Especially in a legislative body with as many members as the U.S. House of Representatives, it is politically nearly impossible for political parties not to form. The reason is that individual representatives lack the institutional authority to significantly influence legislation on their own, so they must pool their influence with other, relatively like-minded members.

In the democratic elections themselves, political scientists usually claim that first-past-the-post voting tends to yield two dominant political parties.