DBWI: No Popular Election

I wanted to bring this topic up again, it's been about a year since I asked this question, so I thought I'd ask it again, considering the Presidential election is this year. I found a book in my college library, explaining that the founding fathers wanted to add something called and the "Electoral College" into the voting process. From what I understand these people are used as representative votes for their states, ie if California voted Democrat (yeah right, as if the Socialist Party would ever let that happen), then these Electorals are supposed to vote Democrat. However, the flaw of this process was that the Electorals did not have to vote for what the majority wanted, they could just as easily vote for one or the other four or five party candidates running for President, how do you think things would have been different if this Electoral College had existed?
 
Probably would have been a bit easier to manage and far less prone to corruption that the current method of election we find today in the United States. The American concept of 'Popular Election' has so little to do with the European idea. In the US the President and Vice President are chosen and elected by the US House of Representatives and its been done so for the past near 200 years since Alexander Hamilton.

It is unfortunate that the candidates do not visit the individual states any more to campaign, I think that fell out of favor during Franklin D. Roosevelt's fourth administration. Now all the wheeling and dealing are done by the state representatives in Washington D.C. during the month preceeding the election.
 
With electors, there might still be such "wheeling and dealing" in Washington as there is today. If the candidates would bribe the electors instead of the reps, corruption would still be rampant (i.e. 76% of Croixans vote for Roosevelt, 10% for Smith, 9% for Bellin, 3% for Gilson, 2% for Jones--Bellin convinces electors to vote for her instead of Roosevelt).
 
I remember reading something about this Electoral College... I didn't quite understand why, but it was supposed to make it so that the smaller population states weren't so horribly outweighed by the larger populated states.

Frankly, I'd like that. The pork barrel projects that come out of DC these days are all geared towards the most populated states, which keeps their Congressmen happy, which makes them vote for the 'generous' party. Meanwhile, the small population states are dying away inch by inch.... maybe with the EC, candidates might have to pay at least some attention to the smaller states. If it wasn't for oil and gas, Wyoming would be practically empty of people, what with our tiny population.... as it is, the cities are shrinking year by year, as people leave for the larger states so they can find a job. Before too long, Wyoming is going to be reduced to the Interstate highways, the oilfields, and a handful of gas stations set up to deal with the shipment of fuel to the rest of the country...
 
Maybe the Civil War would be earlier than happened. You will recall that in the Second Ballots of 1860, 1864 and 1868 Southern people united against the Republicans. It was not until 1880 that Northerners were so united that the Republicans won.
 
Frankly, I'd like that. The pork barrel projects that come out of DC these days are all geared towards the most populated states, which keeps their Congressmen happy, which makes them vote for the 'generous' party. Meanwhile, the small population states are dying away inch by inch.... maybe with the EC, candidates might have to pay at least some attention to the smaller states. If it wasn't for oil and gas, Wyoming would be practically empty of people, what with our tiny population.... as it is, the cities are shrinking year by year, as people leave for the larger states so they can find a job. Before too long, Wyoming is going to be reduced to the Interstate highways, the oilfields, and a handful of gas stations set up to deal with the shipment of fuel to the rest of the country...

OOC: Interestingly I doubt you will have large states - at least in area. Aside from the likes of Texas and California there may be a whole series of small states in the Midwest and West in order that political parties will have enough people in the House of Representatives in order to elect the President. Three to four states may be in the Union in TTL where OTL Wyoming is.
 
Well IIRC the Electoral College was more like an early form of an electoral commission. Notice how a lot of commissions these days have "College" in their name, though this is more promienent in a lot of Commonwealth countries.

The way I remember it, the Founding Fathers distrusted populism because they believed that if there was a popular vote, then the US would be under mob rule. Thus, they wanted to get in an Electoral College. The way it would work is that the people would indirectly elect the President via electing "electors", pretty much. Each state would have something called "electoral votes". These are based on Congressional representation. Thus, for example Rhode Island would have 4 electoral votes - 2 because of the Senate, and 2 because that's how many Representatives Rhode Island has in Congress. The candidate who received the most electoral votes (courtesy of the electors) would win the election. Thus, it's pretty much a "winner-take-all" system.

Now, if it were in place, I could see some elections to be pretty interesting. Obviously we wouldn't have had the amount of parties that we have now - otherwise the CDU would never have gotten off the ground in the early 20th century and be as popular as it is now, especially here in the Northeast and in some areas of the Midwest. Think - who would have imagined that we would have as many Presidents affiliated with the CDU that we have now. I also would think that Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Catholics, Orthodox Christians, and other non-WASP candidates would have a hard time breaking through the Electoral College system, though. If prejudice didn't prevent any candidates from going forward, the Electoral College certainly would.
 
The way I remember it, the Founding Fathers distrusted populism because they believed that if there was a popular vote, then the US would be under mob rule. Thus, they wanted to get in an Electoral College. The way it would work is that the people would indirectly elect the President via electing "electors", pretty much. Each state would have something called "electoral votes". These are based on Congressional representation. Thus, for example Rhode Island would have 4 electoral votes - 2 because of the Senate, and 2 because that's how many Representatives Rhode Island has in Congress. The candidate who received the most electoral votes (courtesy of the electors) would win the election. Thus, it's pretty much a "winner-take-all" system.

I think the only reason they would have put the Electoral College in place, would be to assure that a sort of American "nobility" would be created. It would be able to keep the same political party in power for decades, regardless of the voice of the populous.
 
I think the only reason they would have put the Electoral College in place, would be to assure that a sort of American "nobility" would be created. It would be able to keep the same political party in power for decades, regardless of the voice of the populous.

Jep, I think so too - or ensure that only two parties makes it to the top instead of the multitudes that we have now. At least the CDU Presidential candidates try to campaign in every state, which is always a good sign. I have liked the CDU ever since I heard about it, which of course made my parents look at me a bit strangely, even though one of them is a Democrat and the other one is a Republican. But hey, I do know this - if the Electoral College were in place the CDU would not exist.
 
OOC: Interestingly I doubt you will have large states - at least in area. Aside from the likes of Texas and California there may be a whole series of small states in the Midwest and West in order that political parties will have enough people in the House of Representatives in order to elect the President. Three to four states may be in the Union in TTL where OTL Wyoming is.

:confused: OOC: why would they do that? unless they make the minimum population for statehood really small, it wouldn't work...
 
:confused: OOC: why would they do that? unless they make the minimum population for statehood really small, it wouldn't work...

OOC: Great heavens is it that hard to figure it out? Keep the population threshold the same for states, but just admit more states. There will always be a base minimum number of Representatives per states depending upon the states' population.

OTL Wyoming and Colorado (for example) at their smallest population can have between themselves six representatives (or however many the minimum Constitutional number is) - three each. Those are just six seats that either the Democratic or Republican Party can fight for. However, if both territories had been divided into four states and admitted that would be eight states where there may have been two and now there are 24 seats up for contest.

The older states will divide and dilute the representational power of the Western states, since it less likely that they will all always be united for a political cause and create additional seats that can be contested and won if the election of the President is down in the House of Representatives.
 
OOC: Great heavens is it that hard to figure it out?

apparently it is, because I'm really not following you on this. If you don't change the minimum population requirement, and a territory has barely this minimum (as was the case in most of the Rocky mountain states), how do you split it up into more states? To be sure, WY is big enough to split into 3 or 4 eastern size states, but the population minimums just aren't there (especially back in the 1890's..). Are you saying you wait until a territory has the min. pop., make it a state, and then split it up, regardless of whether each mini-state has the required population?
 
apparently it is, because I'm really not following you on this. If you don't change the minimum population requirement, and a territory has barely this minimum (as was the case in most of the Rocky mountain states), how do you split it up into more states? To be sure, WY is big enough to split into 3 or 4 eastern size states, but the population minimums just aren't there (especially back in the 1890's..). Are you saying you wait until a territory has the min. pop., make it a state, and then split it up, regardless of whether each mini-state has the required population?

Don't worry about population minimums - they stay the same. Its just that there are smaller states carved out of the lands west of the Mississippi. The result will not be 48 continental states, but probably more. Texas could be admitted, but later divided into three during Reconstruction. California would be admitted as two seperate states, North California and South California. There would be the states of Oklahoma and Sequoyah ITTL rather than just Oklahoma. Its all about drawing lines on the map and the Congress basically saying that the general size of new states will have the same the area as Illinois or Ohio.
 
Top