What is the Electoral College?
Because it is unique to our political system, the AP® US Government & Politics exam is almost certain to test you on your knowledge of the Electoral College. What is the Electoral College, again? No—it’s not somewhere you get accepted to if you get a lot of 5’s on your AP® exams.
You’re probably too young to remember the 2000 presidential election, but you’ve certainly heard about it, and probably talked about it in class. George W. Bush, was elected despite losing the national popular vote (popular meaning, the most votes) because he was awarded Florida’s electoral votes.
Electoral College Origins
The Founding Fathers didn’t have much faith in the voters to pick the president without some help from their leaders. They felt that the public had a limited grasp of the issues. So the Electoral College was designed to balance the popular will with political leaders’ wisdom. The voters’ choices would be filtered through state legislatures.
In a presidential election, each state legislature sends a slate of electors—the number of electors based on a state’s number of congressional districts plus two (for its senators) to go to Washington and elect a president.
Most state legislatures selected electors who would vote for the candidate the voters chose—but the Constitution (Article II, Section 1) does not require this.
Then, the candidate who received the majority of the electoral vote became president. Usually—but not always—this candidate also happened to have won the popular vote.
There have been three presidential candidates who won the popular vote but lost the Electoral College vote:
1. Samuel Tilden losing to Rutherford B. Hayes in 1876
2. Grover Cleveland losing to Benjamin Harrison in 1888
3. Al Gore losing to George W. Bush in 2000
There have been a number of elections that came close to having the same mixed result. For example, in 2004, John Kerry lost to George W. Bush by over three million popular votes, but the flip of one state—Ohio—would have made Kerry president. (Surely, the irony would not have been lost on Bush.)
Effects of the Electoral College
The AP® US Government & Politics exam will want you to know what the effects of the Electoral College are.
One effect is that which is mentioned above—sometimes the Electoral College flouts the will of the public. Today, all of the state legislatures (with the exceptions of Maine and Nebraska, which award by congressional district) award all of their state’s electoral votes to the popular vote winner in that state.This is referred to as the “winner-take-all” system.
This means that, even if a Republican candidate get millions of votes in California, or a Democrat gets millions in Texas, they still lose all of that state’s electoral votes.
This dynamic has the additional effect of leading candidates to only spend money and campaign in swing states—states where either party’s candidate has a chance of winning the state’s popular vote.
This is why states like Ohio, Virginia and Florida, which are fairly evenly split between Democrats and Republicans, get so much attention from candidates.
How are Electoral College Votes Apportioned?
As mentioned, each state receives a number of electoral votes equivalent to its number of senators and representatives, for a total of 538 electoral votes. The votes are apportioned the same way congressional districts are—every ten years by the Census. A candidate needs 270 electoral votes to become president.
The most populous states have the most electoral votes. In 2016, for example, California will have 55 electoral votes, Texas will have 38, Florida and New York will have 29, and Illinois and Pennsylvania will have 20. It is possible for a candidate to win the presidency with the electoral votes of only the ten most populous states.
On the other hand, sparsely populated states like Montana and Vermont only have three electoral votes. Still—the electoral vote gives these states more influence than a popular vote-based system would. Three electoral votes can change the result in a close electoral vote.
Criticisms of the Electoral College
There are lots of criticisms of the Electoral College.
The most common complaint is that whoever represents the popular will—the winner of the popular vote—should be president. Half a million more voters voted for Al Gore in 2000 than voted for George W. Bush.
The other criticism is that by focusing the presidential contest on the swing states, the Electoral College deprives voters in solidly partisan states (like Republican Texas or Democratic California) from being heard.
It is also said that minority party voters in these states (e.g., Democrats in Texas or Republicans in California) have little incentive to vote, since their votes won’t affect the outcome of the election at all.
There have been many efforts to amend the Constitution and do away with the Electoral College over the years, but none of them have picked up much steam.
The Electoral College in Action
The electors meet at state capitols in December to cast their ballots. The ballots are then sealed and sent to Congress, where the president of the Senate—the vice president—opens and counts the ballots in January.
The media is allowed to ask electors how they voted in December, and they typically answer. Most states require electors to cast their ballot for the candidate they were chosen to represent—but some don’t.
In 2000, for example, since New Hampshire doesn’t require electors to vote for the candidate the voters chose, some pundits thought the state’s electors, pledged to Bush, might defect and vote for Gore. They didn’t.
If no candidate wins a majority of Electoral College votes—possible in an election with three or more major candidates—the House selects from the top three presidential candidates, and each state gets one vote. D.C. does not get a vote. The winner must get 26 or more state votes, with the House re-voting until this happens.
The Senate selects from the top two vice presidential candidates, and each senator gets one vote. The majority vote winner (51 votes) is sworn in as vice president.
Now let’s take a look at a free-response question about the Electoral College.
A Sample Free Response Question
1. Describe the winner-take-all feature of the Electoral College.
2. Explain one way in which the winner-take-all feature of the Electoral College affects how presidential candidates from the two major political parties run their campaigns.
3. Explain one way in which the winner-take-all feature of the Electoral College hinders third party candidates.
4. Explain two reasons the Electoral College has not been abolished.
It’s easy to answer (a) – discuss how, for all states except Maine and Nebraska, the winner of the popular vote in a state gets all of its electoral votes.
For (b), you want to discuss the concept of ‘swing states’ – parties closely divided between the states whose electoral votes are up for grabs. Candidates spend time and money here at the expense of solidly partisan states.
Part (c) will require you to discuss the dominance of the two parties, Democratic and Republican, and how third parties are unlikely to get any electoral votes at all—and thus no voice in the Electoral College—unless they outperform the two larger parties.
Part (d) will require you to discuss the amendment process—the only way the Electoral College can be abolished—and how the swing states are unlikely to support decreasing their voice in presidential elections. You will also want to discuss fears that a popular vote-based election would favor big cities and major population centers at the expense of rural and sparsely populated areas. (The argument here is that candidates would only spend time in money in places with lots of votes to be had.)
The Wrap Up
Remember, you are likely to encounter questions about the Electoral College on the AP® US Government exam.
The Electoral College is unique to our democracy. The most important points to remember about it are:
1. The Electoral College was created by the Founding Fathers because they believed voters weren’t well-informed enough to choose the president on their own
2. The Electoral College uses a winner-take all system
3. The Electoral College encourages candidates to campaign in ‘swing’ states where the parties are closely matched
4. Occasionally, the winner of the Electoral College (and thus, the presidency) actually loses the popular vote.
Remember, the Electoral College is not as complex as it might seem at first blush. Americans technically vote for electors who support their favored candidate. These 538 electors then convene the month after the election to vote for the president. If you can grasp this idea and the bullet points above, you will be well prepared for Electoral College questions on the US Government & Politics exam.
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