INTRODUCTION
A democratic voting system should be both transparent and fair. The Electoral College System for the Presidency of the USA is neither. The guiding principal and underlying hypothesis of a democratic voting system is that different voters and their votes should have iqual value in the election, with a few exceptions that have either been established or, in some cases, repealed through time. The main idea that defines what democracy should be is that no one is above the system; all voters are inside the system with equal weight; no voter is superior to any other. As soon as it is decided or tolerated that some voters are more worthy than others, the democratic ideal has been desregarded. In American history, the principle has been violated five times in a total of 58 Presidential elections when the Electoral College System has brought to the White House a second-place result:
1824 John Quincy Adams over Andrew Jackson,
1876 Rutherford B. Hayes over Samuel J. Tilden,
1888 Benjamin Harrison over Grover Cleveland,
2000 George W. Bush over Al Gore,
2016 Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton.
Constitutional revisions have brought democratization through the inclusion in the voting process of discriminated citizens who have had their voting rights either denied or abridged.
The Fifteenth Amendment from 1870 prohibited discrimination on the basis of “race, color, or previous condition of servitude”.
The Nineteenth Amendment (1920) ensured that “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.”
The Twenty-Third Amendment (1961) extends to citizens residing in Washington, DC, the right to vote in Presidential elections.
The Twenty-Fourth Amendment from 1964 prohibits poll taxes, mandatory fees paid to the government as a final qualification to vote, which of course discriminated against the poor.
The 1971 Twenty-Sixth Amendment garantees that “the right of citizens … who are eighteen years of age or older to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of age.”
The Electoral College System potentially produces second-place Presidents, a clear distortion of the “one person, one vote” principal cited extensively in Supreme Court decisions in the 1960s. In this comment we investigate the potential size of the maximum possible distortion between the popular vote and the electoral college vote. In other words, what is the maximum vote difference between the second-place candidate (popular vote loser) and the first-place candidate (popular vote winner) and still have the second-place candidate win the Presidency through the Electoral College? The focus of this analysis is that some voters through the Electoral College have had their influence diminished while other voters have been enhanced which clearly violates the “one person, one vote” principle.
The simple diagram can show clearly that the distribution of Electoral College votes (ECV) among States is extremely unequal.
One State alone California has 55 ECVs (the last bar in the graph) while Texas has 38 and both Florida and New York have 29 each. These four States alone have 151 ECVs, more than half the votes needed to elect the President. On the other side of the spectrum where there is one very tall bar in the plot, there are 8 States with only 3 ECVs each and 4 States with 4 ECVs each (12 States with 4 or less ECVs).
A vertical line is drawn at 14 ECVs which cuts the total number of ECVs in half at 269. To the left of the vertical line there are 40 States, incluindo Washington DC, and to the right 11 States. The 11 largest States have a total of 270 in ECVs and the 41 smallest States have a total of 282. Both have the potential to elect the President (270 ECVs needed).
The distribution of ECVs suggests that contradictions in election results are very possible. In order to show the imprecision of the voting system and the size of the maximum distortion, two extreme cases are analyzed. The result is so striking that it makes the Electoral College look nonsensical.
CASE 1: SMALL STATE ADVANTAGE (see the table below)
In the two cases presented here, there are two candidates for the Presidency: Candidate R and Candidate D. In Case 1, each of the smaller 41 States vote by a very slim majority for Candidate R resulting in an accumulation of 282 ECVs. That is enough to elect the President. In this case, Candidate R becomes President. In each of the smaller States, the slim majority is calculated as half of total votes cast + 1. The total number of popular votes for Candidate R is 32,761,519 (about 24 percent of the total vote). Even though Candidate R receives only a very slim part of popular support nationwide, she gets more than 50% of the Electoral College. Each of the larger 10 States votes overwelmingly in a supermajority (unanimity) for the other candidate (Candidate D). The total number of votes for Candidate D in these 10 States is 71,146,282. Adding these votes to the votes Candidate D received in the smaller States produces a total of 103,907,719 (about 76 percent of the total nationwide vote), and still he loses the Presidency because his ECV total is less than the other candidate.
TABLE 1 FOR CASE 1 - Candidate R becomes President
| Popular vote | %Popular vote | ECV | %ECV | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Candidate R | 32,761,519 | 24 | 282 | 52 |
| Candidate D | 103,907,719 | 76 | 256 | 48 |
| TOTALS | 136,669,237 | 100 | 538 | 100 |
ECV = Electoral College Votes
CASE 2: LARGE STATE ADVANTAGE
This case is the mirror image of Case 1. Each of the larger 11 States vote by a very slim majority for the same candidate (Candidate D) resulting in an accumulation of 270 ECVs, enough to elect the President. In each of the larger States, the slim majority is calculated as half of total votes cast + 1. The total number of votes cast for Candidate D is only 37,510,175 (about 72.6 percent of the total popular vote).
TABLE 2 FOR CASE 2 - Candidate D becomes President
| Popular vote | %Popular vote | ECV | %ECV | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Candidate R | 99,159,062 | 72.6 | 268 | 49.8 |
| Candidate D | 37,510,175 | 27.4 | 270 | 50.2 |
| TOTALS | 136,669,237 | 100.0 | 538 | 100.0 |
ECV = Electoral College Votes
CONCLUSION
It seems that the “winner take all” principal in the Electoral College is indefensible and inconsistent for choosing a President, and does not represent the will of the voters consistently from one election to another.
In Case 1, for instance, the value of the smaller States, responsible for the election of Candidate R, turns out to be 3 times greater than the larger States (103,907,719/32,761,519 = 3.17).
In Case 2, the larger States have the advantage, electing Candidate D. The value of the smaller States is now 3 times less than the larger States.
Clearly, these are extreme cases but not impossible, showing the weakness of the System. In normal times, with close Presidential elections, final results can easily betray democratic principals, and the size of the betrayal is unpredictable. (Thanks to James Yeager for discerning comments on an earlier version.)
Keywords
Electoral college, democracy, republic, transparency, fairness