The Electoral College: A vestige of racismEditorial, Top Highlights Thursday, December 22nd, 2016
It is only fitting that the Electoral College did their job and made Donald Trump the president. After all the Electoral College was established for two reasons: to ensure that the general populace could not elect the president because they were not qualified to do so and to guarantee that the “Three-Fifths Compromise” in the Southern states would ensure that the South had a greater representation in selecting the president.
President James Madison, the father of the Constitution, knew that the number of the voters in the North outnumbered those in the South. Yet, there were millions of owned slaves who were not being counted because they could not vote. Madison engineered a compromise where the “Three-Fifths” slave citizens would be counted when allotting Electoral College votes, which allowed the Southern states to have more Electoral College votes. Today, the Electoral College votes are based upon the population of the state. Sounds fair, right? Not so much. Donald Trump won 306 electors with 62,955,363 votes; Clinton won 232 electors with 65,788,583 votes. That means that an elector for Trump represents 205,736 votes, while a Clinton elector represents 283,571 votes. One reason for the discrepancy is turnout; regardless of turnout the number of electors per state is set. In theory if only one voter turned out in Iowa and voted for Trump, he would get their six Electoral College votes. Doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.
The Electoral College rewards those states with lower populations, as well as the lower turnouts. That means good ole red state America. Can you imagine if 100 percent of California voters had turned out in 2016? The Clinton lead could have been over 10 million votes but that would not have meant a hill of beans. Clinton would still only get 55 electoral votes. Yet, Iowa could have one voter turnout for Trump and he would still get six electoral votes. That’s why the Electoral College makes no sense.
The Electoral College was first founded to rig elections by counting slaves as “Three-Fifths” citizens, yet they had no voting power. Now it oppresses the most populous states where minorities and liberals generally live. The result; president-elect Donald Trump who does not represent the majority of the American people. And that’s OK with the Republicans, after all the four other times the Electoral College voted against the popular vote it was in favor of the Republican presidential candidate. Maybe it’s time that the American voter take up the fight and eliminate the Electoral College. That would be the divine irony, the electorate abolishing something created to prevent them from having the final say.
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