In what proved to be a tight race between President George Bush
and Sen. John Kerry, the incumbent candidate came out ahead in both
the electoral and popular vote, quelling some concerns that this
election would be a repeat of 2000.
In light of the 2000 election results where one candidate won
the popular vote and the other the electoral, some have called for
a reform to the electoral system, with one state even putting the
issue on the ballot.
Detractors of the Electoral College point to the electoral
system as being anti-democratic by not giving equal weight to each
vote and not truly representing the will of the majority.
But on the other hand, the system’s proponents support it
on the grounds that it ensures that rural and sparsely populated
areas receive adequate representation and attention in the
elections.
One of the major problems with the Electoral College was
highlighted four years ago when presidential candidate Al Gore won
the popular vote in the election, but his opponent George Bush
assumed office with more electoral votes .
And some believe this represents an inherent flaw in the
Electoral College and undermines the democratic system because each
person’s vote is not counted equally.
“It’s not one person, one vote,” said Matthew
Baum, a political science professor at UCLA. “Having the
popular vote winner loose the election is very bad for … the
legitimacy of our system.”
This discrepancy is particularly notable in close elections,
like this one, because a candidate can win by only a very small
margin and still get all the electoral votes in that state.
“In most cases, it’s plurality rule: you can win 51
percent of the vote and 100 percent of the college,” Baum
said.
This “winner-take-all” approach does not seem to
have affected the outcome of the election this year, but with
presidential races as close as they are, the system still raises
concerns.
Maine and Nebraska are currently the only states that do not
operate on this “winner-take-all” approach, but instead
allocate electoral votes on a congressional district system.
Colorado tried to modify its system through a ballot proposition
apportioning votes based on each candidate’s share of the
popular vote within the state. The proposition did not pass.
But those who support the Electoral College de-emphasize the
importance of the popular vote.
“It’s just not about the popular will at any given
time. It’s about a mechanism which takes into account
structures like federalism,” said John McGinnis, a professor
at Northwestern University School of Law and a former deputy
assistant attorney general at the office of legal counsel at the U.
S. Department of Justice.
And the majority of the popular vote does not necessarily mean
that a candidate is really more popular.
“The misperception is that the popular vote really means
something in a campaign when the objective was to win the electoral
vote,” McGinnis said.
The entire campaign is geared toward winning the electoral vote,
so it is impossible to say what the outcome of any election would
be if the campaign was geared at winning the popular vote, he
added.
The population of the United States is centered in a few urban
areas, so a popular election would give candidates no incentive to
campaign in sparsely populated states. The Electoral College
provides that incentive.
“It’s also useful, I think, in making sure that
people go and campaign in rural parts of the country,”
McGinnis said.
“It makes it more likely that there is support across the
country.”
But while the electoral system may draw candidates to some
states, it pushes them away from others.
“It makes states that are politically divided … much
more important than states that aren’t,” Bennett
said.
And in this system, California does not fall into the category
of an important state.
“They don’t make promises to Californians,”
Bennett said.
And this unequal value on each states is seen by some as a
problem with the current system.
“(It’s) not a good idea that they have incentive to
make promises to some states and not others,” Bennett
said.