Wednesday, August 13, 2008

Why Do We Need an Electrical College Anyway?

{Note:Title pun IS deliberate}


What prompted this was a friend of mine who is generally very sharp, and a constitutionalist conservative sent me a little test on the United States Constitution. I sent it back to her to get the following response:

> And had you, of all people, not done so splendidly...I would have been
> seriously disappointed.. I have to admit to really hurting my brain on
> some, but possibly having helped my one grandson study for his
> Constitution test last Spring helped. I just still do not 'get' this electoral
> vote crap. Appears to be just another way for the government to
> manipulate on their behalf. Just let the people vote and be done with it.

No, no,and NO!

The Electoral College is more important now than ever. There is a reason
this country was named "The United States of America". Prior to the Seventeenth Amendment¹, Senators represented the interests of the State Government, not the People of the state. In the same way, the Electors are a way to make sure that the people and the Government of all the states were represented² in the process of electing the our Chief Executive and Commander-in-Chief.

Now in the twenty first century, there are several great enclaves of people, the Great Megalopolises that could easily control the entire country if plurality was all that was necessary to win. With the Electoral College, every state (even Rhode Island and Idaho) has at least three votes - one for each Senator and one for each Representative in their state. No state is truly powerless even if they are weak. And [a small area of]California, while important, cannot single-handedly overwhelm the entire election.

Now look again to the famous Red State/Blue State map of the 2000 election (or any recent election) and visualize why the Socialists want to have a simple majority win. They wouldn't even need to cheat to win any longer. "Consent of the Governed" would be a thing of the past.

Leave the Electoral College alone. It serves to protect the rest of the United States. And Repeal the Seventeenth Amendment. Turn this back to the United States of America and away from being the Peoples Republic of America. Coincidentally, this was one of the first two "Progressive" changes³ to the US Constitution.

¹http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seventeenth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution.
²Not equally nor proportionally, but a measured combination of equal and proportional
³The other was the graduated income tax.

No comments: