The Electoral College - Can We & How Do We Remove It?

So... if the Electoral College seems outdated to you (which it does to me), given the reasons the Founding Fathers chose to set it up, and you think it should no longer be used, there is one way to go.  A new Constitutional Amendment.
   We could take a "baby step" and demand that our states use the "proportional division" of Maine and Nebraska, and have the elector from each Congressional district cast their vote for the winner of the popular vote in that specific district. However, that won't work in the long run.  There will still be sections of people, especially if gerrymandering continues to exist throughout the United States, who do not receive the representation in government that they wish. This will change a few votes, but it won't really represent the will of the people.
   A new Constitutional Amendment might take some time to pass into law - unless there is a huge groundswell of voters demanding change. For a new Constitutional Amendment to become law, there must a  two-thirds vote of approval in both sections of Congress - the House of Representatives, and the Senate, or a vote of support by 38 State Legislatures.  This poses special challenges in the case of the Electoral College that affects some states more than others.  Perhaps not as much from smaller states, where the historical record shows are not necessarily against a popular vote. More than likely, the resistance would be from political elites who find it easier to manage a national election in a few states; or from the so-called swing states themselves. - Why would they want to forego the extra monetary and publicity revenue from being targeted, or the extra support from federal programs by the parties, who usually woo the highly valued elected leaders and voters for the next spending spree in another four (or three) years?
   But Article Two of the US Constitution (you know the one, the one that the current President says gives him the right "to do anything I want") provides another route. It is based on the power vested in states to instruct how their Electoral College electors are appointed. Article Two says that each state shall appoint, "in such a manner as the Legislature thereof may direct" the Presidential electors allotted to them.  Therefore, State Legislators are free to select electors to be based upon the outcome of the national popular vote. If enough states whose combined electoral votes add up to 270 or more do so, then the President will effectively be chosen by the popular vote.
    The National Popular Vote organization and its civic allies are pursing this route. It has gained bi-partisan support of constitutional scholars, elected officials and nonpartisan civic organizations. It has passed in Republican- and Democratic-led legislative bodies in 33 legislative chambers in 22 states. To date the legislatures of 11 states representing 165 electoral votes have voted to join what is called the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, an agreement to award all their respective electoral votes to whichever presidential candidate wins the overall popular vote. Inter-state compacts can require Congressional approval. Views differ on whether it applies here. Either way, the leading supporters of the National Popular Vote have made it clear they will seek Congressional approval to forge a national consensus.

It won’t be easy. With two hundred years of inertia and time to build up myths of why the Electoral College even exists, it’s a challenge.

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   Looking back to 1787, an indirect election may have made some sense as a bridge between colony and free nation. But the standard and expectations of democracy in the U.S. have changed. For decades a majority of Americans across state and partisan lines have opposed the Electoral College. The time for change is long overdue. It was flawed then, it is flawed now. Divisive then and divisive now.

   If our founders were with us on election night in 2016 watching CNN’s iconic red and blue map to see 38 of 50 states and two-thirds of the U.S. population left on the sidelines, they might well agree it’s time as well.

   James Madison surely would. The Electoral College was always a compromise for him. John Hamilton possibly would, too.  He mainly wanted to leave the selection of the President to a small august group of appointed “electors” rather than to either Congress, as some then suggested, or to the public. Hamilton’s elite model never happened. Who the electors were, and their qualifications, quickly became irrelevant.

But Thomas Jefferson perhaps said it best.
“…(N)o society can make a perpetual constitution, or even a perpetual law. The earth belongs always to the living generation. They may manage it then, and what proceeds from it, as they please, during their usufruct [time of use]. They are masters too of their own persons, and consequently may govern them as they please. But persons and property make the sum of the objects of government. The constitution and the laws of their predecessors extinguished then in their natural course with those who gave them being. This could preserve that being till it ceased to be itself, and no longer. Every constitution then, and every law, naturally expires at the end of 19 years [each generation]. If it be enforced longer, it is an act of force, and not of right.”
From a letter from Thomas Jefferson to James Madison, 6 Sept. 1789, Papers 15:392—97

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   What can you do to facilitate change?  What can you do to help do away with the Electoral College itself?

     Talk; communicate your feelings regarding a popular vote for the President of the United States.  Speak to friends, family, neighbors, co-workers, members of clubs and associations and the religious group you belong to.  Telephone, write and e-mail your local representatives in government - in your city, county, and state.  Contact your representatives in your State Legislature, and the Governor of your state.  Contact your state Representatives and Senators serving in the United States Congress.

   If enough people rise up (as in the Revolutionary War) against the Electoral College, and make statements that they prefer a popular vote to select the President of the United States, and make this choice plainly known to their duly elected representatives in government, then this choice will be able to succeed.  

   If you do nothing, sit on your hands, and verbally complain about the Electoral College - but do nothing to rectify the situation by contacting your elected officials - then you are a part of America's problem today.  You have become apathetic and are saying, in essence, "I don't like it, but someone else has to stop it."

   

Please contact ALL of your governmental representatives regarding

abolishing

the Electoral College.

It was, and is, flawed and divisive to our country in this day and age.