Who votes for the President? You probably don't know.
Wellington Webb, Terry Philips, Camilia Auger, Pam Shaddock, Jenifer Trujillo-Sanchez, Don Strickland, Ann Knollman, Polly Baca, and Margaret Atencio went to designated place in 2008 and cast their votes for President and Vice President of the United States. They were the only people to vote for President that day in Colorado.
It was the first Monday after the second Wednesday in December, December 15th specifically, and rather than go to their local church, school, or other polling place - they met in the Governor's office.
They were nine of the 538 Presidential Electors making up the Electoral College. Created by Article II of the United States Constitution, the Electoral College is one of the many "buffers" the Founders put between democracy and our Constitutional Republic. The Federalist Papers anticipated that the few selected electors would be "most capable of analyzing the qualities adapted to the station, and acting under circumstances favorable to deliberation, and to a judicious combination of all the reasons and inducements which were proper to govern their choice. A small number of persons, selected by their fellow-citizens from the general mass, will be most likely to possess the information and discernment requisite to such complicated investigations."In practice and reality - the Electors vote for the candidate who won the most votes in their respective states.
The result of the Electoral College is fourfold: (1) Smaller state voters get a slightly disproportionate vote in the election of the President; (2) A successful candidate must appeal beyond one region of the country; (3) Under our two-party system, only a handful of states are really competitive, and therefore are subject to (some say) unwarranted attention, and even, perhaps, unwarranted deciding vote in the process; and (4) Majority Political parties must form.
Smaller states get a larger voice.
California had a population of 36,756,666 in 2008 according to the US Census. It has 55 Electoral College Votes. North Dakota has a population of 641,481 and three Electoral Votes.
California’s population to electoral votes is 668,303 residents for each electoral vote. Although it has 12% of the population, but only 10.22% of the electoral votes.
South Dakota’s population to electoral votes is 222,767 residents for each electoral vote. South Dakota’s electoral votes account for one-half of one percent (0.005%) of the electoral college, while it accounts for less than half that same percentage (0.0021%) of the US Population.
Candidates must appeal beyond one state or region to win.
Of all the implications of the Electoral College System, this is the most intended consequence. A politically united populous region cannot overwhelm other less populous regions. The winner-take--all system discourages candidates from spending all their time in one region or state. If the election depnded upon a popular vote, a candidate would spend money and resources to get as many votes as possible in one state - in order to offset fewer votes in another state. Once a candidate obtain 50.1% of the votes of the state - all of the electoral college votes are in hand. Spending more money to obtain more votes in that state will not help.
Battleground states are created.
The Electoral College System, combined with demographics, create a mostly reliable mix of so-called “Blue” and “Red” States. Reliable Democratic blue Electoral rich states include California, New York, Illinois, Pennsylvania, and Michigan. Democrats can rely easily upon having a base of 200 of the 270 electoral college votes. Republican states include Texas, much of the South, and much of the heartland states. These account for 200 electoral votes.
As a result, Presidential campaigns must focus a majority of their energy, after securing the base, on high-value States such as Florida (21-29), Ohio (20-18), and Missouri (11-10) that are not dominated by one party or the other. The American Southwest - Nevada, Colorado, and New Mexico with (19-20) electoral college votes has become a battleground in the past ten years. (Latter number as of the 2010 apportionment.)
Minority parties cannot win.
Most states have a “winner-take-all system that grants all of that state’s electoral college votes to the candidate receiving the most votes. Nebraska and Maine have adopted systems that award each congressional district’s electoral vote to the winner of that District. The winner of the state gets the remaining two votes. In practice though, the winner of the state has won all of the congressional districts. The one exception being the 2008 Election when Obama picked up one of Nebraska’s five electoral votes.
Thus a minority party will likely garner no official vote. However, as Al Gore found out in 2000, and George HW Bush found out in 1992, a similar minority party may impede your ability to win a particular state.
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