Inconvenient Facts About the Electoral College

The Electoral College has its internal logic and mathematics that are not easy to understand in depth. Constitutionally, a person voted for as President in the Electoral College and received any majority of votes from all the appointed electors (as a result of counting these electoral votes in Congress in the January that follows the election year) becomes President. (This is, however, the case provided this person meets all the constitutional eligibility requirements of the office of President.) However, since the 1824 election, votes cast in all the states that appoint their electors by holding popular elections have been tallied. This tally of votes cast (nowadays) in 50 states and in D.C. for electors of presidential candidates does not have any constitutional status. Yet it is customarily considered as the popular vote that presidential candidates receive nationwide. This chapter analyzes the conceptions of (a) the popular vote, (b) the voting power of a voter (c) the voting power of a state, and (d) the will of the nation in a presidential election, along with their customary understanding by a sizable part of the American people. The chapter presents percentages of the popular vote that could have elected President one of the candidates in the elections held from 1948 to 2004.