The Electoral College and Its Impact on Voter Turnout
Introduction
In what are perhaps the most volatile of dinnertime conversation topics, politics and elections take to the forefront of our daily lives in major fashion once every four years. This is of course when many Americans head to the polls to cast their votes for who they want to see in the oval office. Months, in fact almost a year, of campaigning culminates on that Tuesday evening in November as the fate of a nation is decided. However few people fully understand just how that election process works. We have all heard of the electoral college but few of us fully understand it or its impact on our democratic process. This election process divides our nation into two parties and directly impacts everything from campaigning to voter turnout and can even affect the outcome of the election altogether.
How The Electoral College Came To Be The process by which we elect our executive branch has been the same since the Constitution was ratified in 1787. Article II, Section I of the Constitution sets the framework for how a president is elected, or rather selected. As the Constitution states “The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America. He shall hold his Office during the Term of four Years, and, together with the Vice President, chosen for the same Term, be elected, as follows: Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or Person holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United States, shall be appointed an Elector.
The Electors shall meet in their respective States, and vote by Ballot for two Persons, of whom one at least shall not be an Inhabitant of the same State with themselves. And they shall make a List of all the Persons voted for, and of the Number of Votes for each; which List they shall sign
In what are perhaps the most volatile of dinnertime conversation topics, politics and elections take to the forefront of our daily lives in major fashion once every four years. This is of course when many Americans head to the polls to cast their votes for who they want to see in the oval office. Months, in fact almost a year, of campaigning culminates on that Tuesday evening in November as the fate of a nation is decided. However few people fully understand just how that election process works. We have all heard of the electoral college but few of us fully understand it or its impact on our democratic process. This election process divides our nation into two parties and directly impacts everything from campaigning to voter turnout and can even affect the outcome of the election altogether.
How The Electoral College Came To Be The process by which we elect our executive branch has been the same since the Constitution was ratified in 1787. Article II, Section I of the Constitution sets the framework for how a president is elected, or rather selected. As the Constitution states “The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America. He shall hold his Office during the Term of four Years, and, together with the Vice President, chosen for the same Term, be elected, as follows: Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or Person holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United States, shall be appointed an Elector.
The Electors shall meet in their respective States, and vote by Ballot for two Persons, of whom one at least shall not be an Inhabitant of the same State with themselves. And they shall make a List of all the Persons voted for, and of the Number of Votes for each; which List they shall sign
Cited: "2008 General Election Turnout Rates." United States Elections Project. N.p., n.d. Web. 1 Nov. 2012. . "2012 Presidential Election Electoral Vote Maps and Polls." Freedom 's Lighthouse ». N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Nov. 2012. . "Ad Spending in Presidential Battleground States." NationalJournal.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 7 Nov. 2012. . "National Voter Turnout in Presidential Elections, 1960 to 2008 - ILLUSTRATION BY GGS CREATIVE..." Gale Encyclopedia of American Law. Ed. Donna Batten. 3rd ed. Vol. 10. Detroit: Gale, 2010. Gale Opposing Viewpoints In Context. Web. 13 Nov. 2012. "Presidential Election Facts." History.com. A&E Television Networks, n.d. Web. 7 Nov. 2012. . "Swing States Law & Legal Definition." Swing States Law & Legal Definition. N.p., n.d. Web. 7 Nov. 2012. . "Transcript of the Constitution of the United States - Official Text." Transcript of the Constitution of the United States - Official Text. N.p., n.d. Web. 1 Nov. 2012. .