It’s been just over a week since the presidential election and once again, the question about whether or not the United States should keep the Electoral College has come up. The Electoral College should be abolished and the majority vote should determine who the president is, no matter what his or her political party affiliation is.
In 2000, Al Gore won the popular vote 48.38 percent over George Bush’s 47.87 percent but because Bush received more Electoral College votes, he won the presidency. Do you believe that’s right? Shouldn’t the voters decide the fate of this country?
The 2000 election clearly showed that the Electoral College can, and possibly will again, fail the nation’s will as to who should be the president. Bush was the Electoral College’s president, not the peoples’ president.
If someone in Texas voted for President Barack Obama but the state he or she lived in had more votes for Mitt Romney, so the state went ‘red’ for Romney, it would seem that person’s vote didn’t count.
This is what happens in so-called ‘safe’ states. Your vote doesn’t seem to count as much as it would in a ‘swing’ state and so the ‘safe’ states are usually called before any votes have even been counted.
All of this also contributes to discouraged citizens who may not want to vote, because they feel that it won’t matter in the end. Their vote holds no value to them and why should it? The Electoral College has already determined that their state is going to go into one of the political party’s corners.
Every American’s vote should count. It’s their right to vote and they should be heard, no matter how far to the right or left their views are. The Electoral College should either be amended so that it would take the popular vote more into account, or it should just be abolished.
Sources
http://uselectionatlas.org/INFORMATION/INFORMATION/electcollege_procon.php
http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/
http://www.archives.gov/federal-register/electoral-college/faq.html
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