| American Government |
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| Sections: Introduction | Section 1 | Section 2 | Section 3 | Section 4 |
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Government : Political Participation : Section Three Elections
Every four years, the president and vice president are elected through a system based on the Electoral College. The Electoral College is a group of people, called presidential electors, who are chosen in each state and Washington D.C. who cast the formal votes for the president and vice president. When a voter votes in a presidential election, he/she is not actually casting a ballot for their selected candidate, but rather is endorsing members of the Electoral College who will then directly vote for the president. The voter’s ballot will say the names of the candidates, as show below, but since presidents and vice presidents are elected indirectly, the vote is really being cast for an Elector who will officially choose the president and vice president.
You’ll also notice on this ballot, that there are several minor party candidates listed. Not all minor party candidates make it on the ballot in all states. This ballot was from California in the 2004 election. The number of Electoral College representatives each state gets is determined by the state’s population. This number, like seats in the House of Representatives, is calculated using census data. To determine the number of electoral votes each state gets, one must simply add the number of Senators for that state (always 2) to the number of members of the House of Representatives for that state. The map below shows how many presidential electors each state had for the 2004 and 2008 elections. A new census was taken in 2010 and will change the number of electors each state will have for the 2012 election.
Once the votes are cast by the voters, it is determined as to which candidate won each state. In most states, the candidate that wins that state will get all of that state’s electoral votes. For example, in the 2004 election, John Kerry won the state of California, so he received that state’s 55 electoral votes. Most states assign electoral votes in a “winner take all” fashion. Some states, however, do not. In some states, candidates receive an electoral vote for receiving the most popular votes in a congressional district.
This system explains how a presidential election can be won by a candidate who did not receive the majority of the popular (people’s) vote. This happened most recently in the 2000 presidential election between Al Gore and George W. Bush. See the map below:
As you can see by the numbers on the map (which indicate electoral votes) and the pie charts to the right, Al Gore received more of the popular vote – 48.4% to Bush’s 47.9%, however Bush received more of the electoral votes – 50.5% to Gore’s 49.5%. Because of the fact that a candidate can win the popular vote but lose the election, the question has been raised as to whether the Electoral College system should be abolished. When the Constitution was drafted and the plans were made for how to do a nationwide election, it was very difficult for the entire nation to communicate with one another and communication took days, even weeks. Because of this, the Electoral College system made sense when it was created. Now, with modern technology, communication is quick and easy. Some say that we should change the system, but others feel we should leave it alone.
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The campaign is over and it’s Election Day – how is the winner decided? It’s not quite as simple as whoever gets the most votes wins. The system for electing the president is quite complex and that is what we will focus on in this section.
Because of exit polls conducted by the media on Election Day, it is generally clear by the end of the night who the winner of the election will be – even though the official votes are not cast until December. The rest of the procedure is practiced as tradition. Forty-one days following Election Day, the electors meet in their state’s capital and cast their official votes. The electoral college thus does not meet together as a single body. Electoral votes from each state are collected and sent to the President of the Senate (the Vice President), who then hands them over to Congress once they convene in early January. Then the votes are officially counted in the presence of both houses of Congress. According to the Constitution, if no one receives a majority of electoral votes following Congress’ official counting, the House of Representatives is charged with deciding the election. 
Discussion 2 – Why would someone argue that the Electoral College system should remain the same? What arguments could be used to support changing the system? Which side of this argument are you on? Be sure to fully explain your point of view.
View this presentation about how the president is elected.
Now it’s time to take the quiz on section 3. When you are finished, proceed to section 4.