Introduction
Electoral colleges are is special voters that determine the candidates declared for president-elect in the United States. According to the 6th Amendment of the Constitution of the United States, the electoral colleges consist of 538 electors of 270 are required for a candidate to declared president in the United States. Apart from the popular votes, it is constitutionally required that a candidate for president satisfy the Electoral College threshold. For example, in the last election, Trump got 304 electoral votes while Hilary got 227 and therefore Trump satisfied the threshold of 270 electoral votes (Tocqueville et al., 2017). Following the George W. Bush in 2000 where he lost in the popular vote and won the electoral college vote with 272 against his competitor 266 and the same happened in 2016 when Donald Trump lost the popular vote and won the electoral college vote by 304 votes against Hillary 227, there has been debate to repeal the college vote and replace it with the direct voting where the candidate with the majority vote is declared the winner.
The Electoral College ensures political stability in the United States in that it enables the country to exercise the principle of indirect democracy which fosters political stability. The Electoral College ensures that there is a distribution of popular support across States including the district of Colombia. An election is part of the development initiative of a country and there is the need for equal distribution of the support to a candidate elected president. Again, the Electoral College ensures that even the minority group in the United States has a say in the election. This ensures that the sovereignty of the people in the constitution is adhered to. It also cushions the country against the tyranny of numbers in different States which may disadvantage other States. Moreover, it ensures a system of national representation in the United States. In other countries, especially Sub-Sahara Africa where direct democracy is practiced, there are other vices that compromise the sovereignty of the people and encourage other social vices such as corruption and bribery of voters((Tocqueville et al., 2017). Finally, it ensures that every candidate whether from the minority group, marginalized group or majority have equal opportunity to be elected president. More importantly, the Electoral College ensures that the election is not about the popularity contest but a policy and development oriented to safeguard the interest of the American people.
However, the Electoral College has some drawbacks. For example, it discourages people to participate in the voting process since the people do not have the direct say on who becomes the president. In the United States, popular votes are required but not essential for the declaration of the president (Hale et al., 2015). This is demonstrated by the election of the George W. Bush in 2000 and Donald Trump in 2016 where they were declared president when they lost in the popular votes. The electoral college encourage candidates to ignore some states since the popular votes in each state is awarded all the electors and therefore, the candidates are not motivated to visit all states. This is the case where there are states belonging to Democrats and Republicans in the United States.
Direct democracy which others have proposed goes against the wish of the founding fathers of the United States. When the electoral votes are repealed and replaced with the direct election, the political stability of the United States can be threatened (the United States, 2011). For example, in the African countries where there are no electoral colleges, there is a political war that has led to conflicts and deaths. Therefore, direct democracy hinders the minority from having a say on the election and other vices such bribery of voters and tyranny of numbers may dilute the gains that the Americans people have achieved so far.
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In conclusion, it is evident that Electoral College serves the purposes of checks and balances and ensuring that the candidate declared as president of the United States has a national outlook and representation. Therefore, this paper stronger advice against repealing the Electoral College as it means well for the American people.
References
Hale, K., Montjoy, R. S., & Brown, M. (2015). Administering elections: How American elections work.
Tocqueville, A., In Bowen, F., & Reeve, H. (2017). Democracy in America: New York. Dover Publications Inc.
The United States. (2011). The Electoral College.
