Larry P. Arnn:
The outrage from Hillary Clinton supporters came immediately: Donald Trump might have won the Electoral College, but he appears to have lost the popular vote. This was said to be a violation of democracy, one that defied the principle of “one man, one vote.” A Yale professor slandered the Founders by telling the website Vox that the Electoral College was created to protect slavery.
We can think about this better if we understand two things: What does the Electoral College do, and why does it do it?
On Dec. 19, the electors of every state and the District of Columbia will meet. Each state has the same number of electors as it does U.S. senators and representatives combined. The state legislature decides how the electors are selected.
The chosen electors are bound by custom everywhere and by law in many states to support the presidential candidate who won their state’s popular vote. If they fail to vote this way, they will be “faithless electors.” This has happened but rarely in the history of the presidency.
Everything about this process is as the Constitution directs, with the exception of the last bit. Nothing in the founding document requires electors to support the candidate who wins the popular vote in their state. In America’s early years many states did not even conduct popular presidential elections.
Instead electors were picked by state legislatures or by governors. The Framers had the idea that the electors, in choosing a president, would vote their consciences after deep discussion—and sometimes this happened. Often, however, electors were selected because they had declared support for a particular candidate.
As the practice of holding a popular vote spread, it was natural that the electors would follow those results. Still, the Electoral College continues to recognize that Americans vote by state—in the same way that they elect the Senate and the House, and the same way that they voted those many years ago to ratify the Constitution.
But now there is a national movement to require that electors support the presidential candidate who wins the national popular vote. The proposal, called the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, has been passed by 10 states and the District of Columbia. Implementing this practice would be a disaster.
Consider for a minute why the Electoral College was invented. Although it is odd, it is also a plain expression of the Constitution, part of the structure that has made America’s founding document the best and longest lived in history.
The Constitution reflects the paradox of human nature: First, that we alone among earthly things may exercise our own volition; second, that sometimes we exercise such power badly. This is why we require laws to protect our rights, as well as restraints upon those who make and enforce those laws.
The Constitution is paradoxical most of all about power, which it grants and withholds, bestows and limits, aggregates and divides, liberates and restrains. Elections are staggered, so as to distribute them across time. The founding document also divides power across space; the people grant a share of their natural authority to the federal government, but another share to the states where they live.
I see where Barbra Boxer is sponsoring a bill to eliminate the electoral collage Yeah leave it to these dirty demacrats to come up with such a stupid bill I have a better idea we need to eliminate the EPA,EEOC,DHS, and our nations membership in the Useless Nations