Dear Cecil:
In the U.S. a Presidential candidate can win the “popular vote” but lose the election due to not winning the “electoral vote.” Would you please explain what the Electoral College really is and how this system works? I find the whole thing very confusing! Thank you in advance 
On a related note, could you help me name the bones in the lower leg?
Yes they can, it happens rarely.
The electoral vote of each state is determined by the number of senators (always 2) + number of members of the House of Representatives (minimum of 1 per state). The number of representatives is proportional to population.
For example, California, as the most populous state, has 55 electoral votes. Wyoming, the least populous state, has 3 electoral votes. There are a lot of other states with 3 electoral votes as well, because they have very few people living in them.
Most states award their electoral votes on a winner-takes-all, first-past-the-post voting system. This means that, in 48 states, the person who wins the most votes, whether that is 42% or 67%, wins all of that state’s electoral votes.
For example, California will award all 55 of their electoral votes to Obama, because most people in California voted for Obama, but a lot of them voted for Romney.
According to the constitution, you need an outright majority of the votes in the electoral college to become president. There are 538 electoral votes total possible, so a minimum of 270 is needed to win.
The electoral college is just a fancy name for these 538 people who are selected by their state party to vote based on how the people in their state voted.
So, in California, there will be 55 people chosen who will vote for Obama when the electoral college votes, since Obama won that state with the most votes.
An electoral college voter can change their vote, and voter for whomever they want, however, this rarely ever happens. In fact, the people chosen are carefully vetted so the chance of them voting against their selected candidate is very small. These are called faithless electors, and they have never changed the outcome of an election, and certainly never will.
I had a high school teacher who insisted they were the tibia and the fibia. He refused to acknowledge his error, no matter how many sources I showed him.
Having broken a FIBULA it was simplified for me. The smaller bone is the fibula as a fib is a SMALL lie.
From the other thread, I said:
Basically the framers of the constitution did not want someone from, say, Virginia to carry his state by an overwhelming margin and become president on that tally, just because several other people split the other votes. Plus, until quite a while after 1789, many places had a show of hands in a town square as voting, so it’s not as if voting counts were reliable or free from undue influence, or even outright lies.
Also, in the days when news travelled at the speed of horse, as did people, it was rather difficult to run a country-wide election. One thing I read said that with the exception those who were really, really popular across the country, like George Washington, the framers of the constitution expected that in general, the election would pick the top 3 candidates. However, these would be indirect picks from the electors, basically elder statesmen types picked for their wisdom to select the best candidate. Most of the time the congress would then pick the pres and VP from these top 3 choices of the elctoral college.
Boy, did they get it wrong. Party politics, and winner-take-all elector systems were totally unforseen. But remember, the USA was originally a federation of states, so they left a lot of the rules up to individual states.
Originally, electors voted for 2 people; the highest number got president, the second, VP. After the electors for one party screwed up and voted in exactly equal number for president and VP nominees Jefferson and Burr (thus producing a tie, sending it to the congress) the rule was changed so they votes separately for president and VP.
Sorry, meant to also say:
To win the electoral college, a candidate had to get a majority of votes. So originally, unless elder staesmen from all across the country (the electors) decided by a majority that X was the best choice for president, it fell to congress to decide.
Let’s not forget that Washington D.C. is also represented in the electoral college, although it’s not a state. The 23rd amendment gives it the number of electors it would have if it were a state, not to exceed the number of electors for the state with the smallest population (currently Wyoming). This means that D.C. gets three electors.
It’s hard to imagine a scenario where D.C. would get more electors than three. The proportion of the U.S. population that resides in D.C. and in several of the smallest states would have to grow a lot for this to happen. It could also happen by constitutional amendment, I suppose.
The last time someone won the electoral vote while failing to win the popular vote was in 2002, when Bush won the presidency over Gore. There’s a chart showing the electoral and popular votes here.
Are the feet no longer part of the lower legs?
To continue this a bit, it also has a strong effect on how the candidates campaign.
California awards 55 electoral votes. With 270 needed to win, 55 is a huge prize to come from just one of the states. But neither of the candidates campaigned there (though they may have held fundraising events). California is known by everyone to have a reliable Democratic majority. It was known well in advance that Obama would get those 55 votes, and it would be a waste of either candidate’s resources (time and money) to try to persuade Californians to vote for him.
In fact, more than 40 of the states were considered done deals well before election day. The presidential election is essentially carried out in those few states where the candidates believe their campaign ads and rallies will make a difference. They’re called “swing states” or “battleground states”. And among those, the ones with the largest populations, and thus the greatest number of electoral votes, get the most attention. The three most crucial states in this election were forecast to be Florida, Virginia, and Ohio.
It even has some impact on governance. It has long been said that our policy toward Cuba is because the president must cater to the desires of the community of Cuban exiles in Florida. With the rest of the state rather evenly divided, it is thought that whoever wins over that group can then win the whole state, and its 29 electoral votes.
The numbers do change over time. We have a constitutionally mandated census every ten years. The results of that determine how many representatives each state gets in the House, and its number of electoral votes (until the next census).
Just to clarify for those confused about the relation between electoral votes (of which 270 are needed to elect a President) and human bones (said to number only 206 in adult):
Human babies are born with 270 (or more) bones.
Hope this helps.
Go to jeffersonhour.com and locate the most recent episode (aired here on Sunday the 4th) or go to itunes for the podcast: episode 996, a very good one that speaks to the electoral college and the machinations that Al Hamilton went through to vie for the whitehouse.
Apparently, in '96 and 1800, New York’s electors were chosen by the state legislature, in the summer, apparently the selection method was not clearly defined early on.
Another purpose of the Electoral College was to set up a body of disinterested citizens to choose the President. The Founders didn’t trust popular elections, fearing a demagogue. At the same time, they didn’t want Congress to decide, partly because of the separation of powers and partly because they worried about the horse trading that would result (vote for me and I’ll include your pet project in the budget).
The solution was to create an independent body that had no connection with Congress and which could make the decision more judiciously. Electors can theoretically vote for anyone they want (though as a practical matter, electors pledge for a candidate and can kiss their political career goodbye if they vote for anyone else*).
This satisfied the Constitutional Convention. They actually expected that there’d be no Electoral College majority most years, but it would cut down the number of choices to three, and since the House of Representatives would have voted by state, it would eliminate promises to individuals.
However, things did not work out the way they foresaw.
*Yes, there are “faithless electors” laws in some states, but they haven’t passed constitutional muster and I’d find it hard to believe they’d be allowed since the Electoral College was intended to be a deliberative body, not a rubber stamp.
Also keep in mind, as I mentioned earlier, that in the 1780’s when the constitution was constituted, everything travelled at the speed of horse. I’m trying to think of the biggest, widest election up until that time… The Greeks and Roman rulers were city states. The only secret ballot I recall was the Ostrokos, to exile someone from Athens(?). Switzerland, British parliament, renaissance Italian city states (how well did that work?) and similar contemporary elections tended to have nothing bigger than a riding, which generally would have been a few towns or less, or a city. The only “election” that spanned a decent size jurisdiction in those days would be that for the pope, but still the cardinals had to congregate for that. A group of “elder wise men” chose the next leader. So it appears the founding fathers modelled their process, either deliberately or by default accidentally, on the Catholic Church, but with the proviso that only the tally, not the electors, had to make it to Washington (or New York, or whatever). Convenietly, by having the vote in 13 places, they also removed the possibility of influence by mobs or the powerful during the conclave.
What about that pact that some states have agreed to that says that the electoral college members from those states will vote for whoever won the overall popular vote regardless of how the state they represent actually voted? The pact won’t kick in until the states who have agreed to it have enough EV votes to decide the election; I think the agreeing states total something like 170 now. Illinois is one of the states who has agreed to the pact.
That has nothing to do with faithless electors, as it is a state law determining how they choose their electors, which the states may change whenever they like. Thing is, this pact may be a constitutional violation, since it enters into a binding pact with other states, which is forbidden by the constitution. I don’t know if the supreme court would interpret this law as a violation of that clause, but it could.
States can choose their electors however they want…proportional vote…proportional vote for the ‘house’ electors with the two ‘senate’ electors going to the overall winner…electors based on party registration, or simply selected every election by the state legislature (thereby disenfranchising the entire state). Now, some of these might cause revolt in the state, so they won’t ever be enacted, but the popular vote compact seems fine. (though I’m not sure how I feel about it).
IIRC some states ahve laws binding their electors to vote as they promised. Of course, then those electors can vote however they want but then they could be prosecuted for it. Other states don’t have such laws since it’s never been a problem. I recall reading that a few elections ago some elector for the losing side voted for someone else just because it didn’t matter.
This has some answers, and lists requirements of state law:
BTW, the term “minority President” is sometimes used to mean a President who won the electoral college but lost the popular vote. This can create confusion when taken out of context. George W Bush was a minority President, Obama is not …
You mean 2004. Minority Presidents:
http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0781456.html
In some of those, a third candidate actually drew a significant number of votes, and the “minority” winner actually had the greatest number of popular votes. For instance, in 1968, George Wallace pulled 13.5% of the popular vote and carried 5 southern states, getting their 46 electoral votes. That was the last time a third candidate actually pulled electoral votes, other than via the occasional “faithless” elector who did not affect the outcome.
Most of the time, what happens at the end of the day is that the electoral college result magnifies the popular vote, so that a couple percentage points in the popular vote translates into winning the electoral college by a much larger margin.
BTW, excuse me … Wallace got 45 electoral votes from five states plus one faithless elector from North Carolina.
You mean 2000. 