The United States of America is not a democracy. This may be news to many, but according to Merriam-Webster, a democracy is defined as “a government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a system of representation usually involving periodically held free elections.” You may be thinking, Well, isn’t the United States a democracy using indirect representation through free elections? The answer is, yes and no.
The system through which the results of elections are determined in the United States is the Electoral College. Many people who have been educated in the United States or have the right to vote in the United States have heard of this system, but don’t really understand how it functions – or the history that comes with it.
The history of the Electoral College
Created by the founding fathers, the electoral college is a system was originally meant to ensure that all states, including the less-populous ones, were adequately represented, and to appease the states that, at the time, held slaves, so that their population would be represented, despite much of their population not having the right to vote (since they weren’t white, land-owning, men).
When one understands the roots of the Electoral College, it makes the question of why it still exists today even more worthy.
How does the Electoral College operate?
The Electoral College consists of 538 electors, who are non-federal employees that are selected by each state every four years. The electors are ultimately the people that vote for the president directly, albeit with the intent of abiding by the votes of the larger population that they represent. Each of the 50 states, and the District of Columbia, have a certain number of electors depending on their population, ranging from 3 to 55. In order to win the presidential election, one candidate must receive 270 electoral vote.
So how can we solve the issues we have with the Electoral College?
Representing everybody sounds equitable, and is the cornerstone of a democracy. However, the United States – and its indirect democracy through the Electoral College – has seen a lot of inequitable issues rise over time. First and foremost for many, there is the problem of the inequitable distribution of electoral votes that contradict the population. For example, the state of California has 39.5 million people and 55 electoral votes. Meanwhile, the state of Wyoming has just under 580,000 people and has three electoral votes. This means that in the state of California, one elector represents about 720,000 people, meanwhile, in Wyoming, one elector represents approximately 193,000 people. Consequently, the average voter of Wyoming is represented nearly four times as much as the average voter of California. In addition to the inequity of the system in its modern rendition, the aforementioned history of the system is not one that should be proudly worn.
So, what can we do about the Electoral College? The simplest solution is to adopt a direct democracy, so that the popular vote is the ultimate vote that determines who wins the presidential election. This would require a Constitutional amendment, but would not be the most challenging or revolutionary solution. However, for a variety of reasons, this isn’t the solution that many people want. An alternative to a popular vote would be to create a more equitable Electoral College, in which the population of states is more reflective of the number of electoral votes given to them. Instead of having an Electoral College where there are a few swing states that everybody is biting their nails over to wait for the results of, the votes could be more appropriately allocated so that a voter of California is represented equally to a voter of Wyoming, and all other states.
The current state of the Electoral College is clearly flawed, and the United States is not a democracy. To be truly equitable, this system must be revised or rewritten. But the future is bright, so long as we take the precautions necessary to make it an equitable place worthy of living in and representing.