The Electorial College goes back to the founding of the USA 240 years ago..... in those days, only congressmen were elected directly by the people. The thought there was that in those days, congressmen represented only about 30,000 people and it was a very temporary job requireing only a few days a year.... it was thought the people had an opportunity to know the candidates and hear from them in that age long before mass media (even then, the press was considered biased.... best if people met the candidates face-to-face). Until quite recently, Senators were elected by the States (not directly by the people) but NOW they are directly elected - but we still have the electorial college for president. A constitutional amendment could change that but such as never been seriously promoted.
The Electorial College most certainly DOES impact things.... a few times, the candidate who won did not win the popular vote (we had a case recently of this) - but it's been very close even when that did happen. And Nixon BARELY lost the popular vote in but lost the electorial college by a significant margin. What it does is place smaller states into play..... indeed, states like Ohio and Florida are very important: elections are often won or loss in a half dozen key states (none of them among our most populous). Big states, like California, are BLESSEDLY void of most campaigning because while California has more electorial votes than any other state, it's a solid Dem state now and so Republicans "write it off" and Democrats have no reason to campagin here - they will win no matter what (typically..... lately). Candiates HAVE to pay attention to smaller states (where the election is largely won or lost) and to every region of the country with all the diversity of culture and issues.
Those who support it note that if all we had is a popular election, a handful of BIG states (on both coasts + Texas) would determine the election, huge states where campaigns would just be TV ads in huge mass-media markets. Most states and regions would be ignored since they simply don't have enough votes to matter much, candidates would be those that appeal to urban (and typically more liberal) coastal areas. THIS is probably the major reason why a Constitutional Amendment would have a tough time passing: it requires 2/3's of the states to approve it, and probably 2/3's of the states would become largely irrelevant if they did. That's the argument that has been used for decades. Frankly, if you look back over the elections of the past century, only once did it ULTIMATELY change things (we would have had Al Gore as President, not George Bush). The campaign would be different (much more expensive, much more a matter of mass media ads, maybe more liberal candidates) but I don't think the outcome would be different in terms of Dem or Rep.
One more point: Foreigners often don't realize that the founding, the tradition, the philosophy, the Constitution of the USA is basically a confederation of states - not the radical federal nationalism that exists in most other nations. TRUE, the political history of the USA has been an ever-growing national government (to which many - it seems including Bill above - are not too happy about): When FDR became president, there were individual states with budgets larger than the federal government - now the budget of the federal government is bigger than those of all 50 states combined. The "shift" has been dramatic..... we are becoming, in practice, more like other nations in this regard. BUT it needs to be deeply appreciated by non-Americans that states here are NOT at all just districts of the federal government.... that's not our culture or tradition or legal heritage AND it's not our Constitution. The Electorial College seems odd even to a lot of very modern Americans but it flows from our understanding of what our nation is: Fifty STATES. And the majority of those states don't want to be essentially cut out of the process.
BTW, on a very related note, the upper house - the Senate - which arguably is more powerful than the lower house - also reveals this culture. Every STATE has two senators - regardless of the population of that state. Wyoming gets two, California gets two. Same political philosophy as we see in the Elecctorial College. And both have never seriously been challenged.
This probably isn't how Denmark would think to do things, but then the USA is not Denmark.
I hope that helps.
- Josiah
Ronald Reagan in 2016!
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