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Elections in America Note to students: The best preparation for taking the reading quiz is to pay close attention to the key terms as you read. Each question in the question banks is directly linked to these key terms and phrases.

Chapter Focus Question: What are the unique qualities of American elections?

Section Focus Question: How does the Electoral College system work?Key Terms:Electoral College

Large and small state electors Obama election in 2012 and electoral support "Unit rule" California electors Senators elected by state legislatures Electoral votes based on Congressional representation

The US presidential election follows a unique process called the Electoral College. When the Founders drafted the Constitution, they set out different voting procedures for each of the elected branches of government. The House of Representatives was elected directly by voters in specific geographic districts: the Senate was elected by the members of the state legislatures: and the president was elected by an entirely different body called the Electoral College.

The Electoral College is made up of electors from each state. The number of electors each state receives is based on its total number of representatives in Congress, that is, the number of members it has in the House of Representatives, plus its two senators. For states with very small populations such as Wyoming and Rhode Island, which have only one member in the House of Representatives, the Electoral College amplifies their influence in the presidential election by adding their two senators, for a total of three Electoral College votes. For large population states such as California and Texas, the addition of two senators to a large number of representatives in the House (53 for CA, 36 for TX), does not increase their political influence significantly.

The Electoral College reflects the compromises that the Framers of the Constitution struggled with in regard to issues of representation, in that both population size through the House of Representatives delegation, as well as equality among the states through the Senate are taken into account. In practice, however, it is neither the largest nor smallest states that hold the most important sway in the Electoral College; it is the “battleground states” that may determine the ultimate outcome of the presidential election in any given year.

Electoral College Votes Allotted by State and District, 2012-2020

A great deal of attention is focused on the “red” vs. “blue” states in the Electoral College map in every presidential election. But in fact the most attention is reserved for the handful of states — usually eight to ten — that will make the difference in reaching the magic number of 270 Electoral College votes for one candidate or the other, and thereby determine the winner of the US presidency.

The total number of Electoral College votes is 538. This is made up of the 435 votes based on the membership of the US House of Representatives, plus the 100 votes from the Senate. Another three Electoral College votes are given to Washington, DC. This is provided for by the 23rd Amendment to the Constitution to ensure that residents of the nation’s capital are represented in presidential elections. A majority of 270 Electoral College votes is therefore needed to win the presidency.

Nearly all states follow the unit rule, meaning that they award all of their Electoral College votes to the candidate who wins the most votes in that state. This is truly a “winner-take-all” system, in which the candidate with a plurality of the vote takes the entire electoral prize for that state, while the second place candidate gets nothing.

Pivotal States, Presidential Election, 2012

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Section Focus Question: How do campaigns strategize with the Electoral College vote?Key Terms:270 electoral votes to win

Winner-take-all and third party candidates Battleground or swing states Winner-take-all rule inflating electoral victory Red states/blue states Red states/blue states and regional dominance PPV and elimination of the Electoral College

A striking example of this system in practice is the 1992 election, in which the independent candidate, Ross Perot, won 19 percent of the popular vote nationwide, but did not receive a single Electoral College vote because he failed to place first in any state. The Democratic candidate, Bill Clinton, was therefore elected as president in 1992 with 43 percent of the popular vote, but a clear majority of 370 out of 538 in the Electoral College.

Only two states, Nebraska and Maine, do not follow the unit rule, but instead divide their Electoral College votes proportionately, based on the winner in each congressional district in the state.

Presidential Election Results, 1992

Because of this unique electoral system, US presidential campaigns follow a peculiar kind of mathematical logic. Candidates and their campaign teams study the Electoral College map, marking off the states that have a strong advantage for one party or the other and are therefore expected to go either "blue” (Democrat) or “red” (Republican). Many of the large population states, such as California, Texas, and New York, have voted consistently Democrat or Republican in recent elections, and therefore receive little attention from candidates of either party, since they are not “in play” in the Electoral College.

Once the solid “red” and “blue” states have been marked off on the map, the states that are still uncertain as to which way they will “swing” in a given election year are added up to determine how each combination of Electoral College votes will affect the outcome. In recent years, states like Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio,

Virginia, and Wisconsin have been among the “battleground states” that have held the power to determine the Electoral College outcome, and have therefore received the greatest attention from the presidential campaigns. The battleground states tend to be more closely divided between Democratic and Republican voters, and are therefore less predictable than other states.

“Red” and “Blue” States

Could the Electoral College ever be abolished? It is sometimes argued that the Electoral College is outdated and impractical, and does not reflect the true will of the American population. This argument was particularly vehement after the 2000 election, in which Democrat Al Gore won a majority of the popular national vote by a very narrow margin over Republican George W. Bush (less than 500,000 votes nationwide), but the election outcome was ultimately decided when the US Supreme Court ruled that vote recounts in Florida should be stopped, giving the Electoral College victory to Bush (271 Bush, 266 Gore). This kind of discrepancy between the Electoral College and popular vote outcomes has happened only 4 times in American history, but it clearly goes against a sense of fairness and raises questions about legitimacy when it occurs.

So what are the chances of doing away with the Electoral College at this point? Realistically, the odds are against it. First, there is a great deal of inertia in political systems, and change is difficult, as there is usually strong support for the status quo, particularly among those who benefit most under the current system. Second, changing the way the president is selected would require a Constitutional amendment, which is a very difficult hurdle to clear. For those who would like to see the presidential election process reflect the popular vote more directly, the most pragmatic route would be to encourage states to split their Electoral College votes proportionately, rather than following the unit rule. This would preserve the Electoral College as required by the Constitution, but produce a result that would more accurately mirror the national popular vote in practice.

Presidential Election of 2000 Under Popular Proportional Vote

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Section Focus Question: How does America’s two-party system differ from the rest of the world?Key Terms:Third parties and their prominence

PPV and third parties PPV and parliaments Political party primaries Electoral College and the amendment process Federalist and Anti-federalists Origin of the Republican Party Two-party system

Why does America have only two parties? Will this ever change? Having an extremely stable two-party system is an important feature of American politics. Throughout US history, we have consistently had two major political parties, with a variety of minor “third parties” that have been relatively short-lived.

The first two parties in American politics were the Federalists and the Anti-Federalists, which emerged out of the debates surrounding the adoption of the new Constitution in 1787-88. Over time, the Anti-Federalist Party shifted into the Democratic-Republican Party under the leadership of Thomas Jefferson, and then into the Democratic Party, which has survived as one of the two major parties today. The Republican Party became the second major party when it displaced the Whig Party at the time of the Civil War, with the election of Abraham Lincoln as president in 1860.

National Union Ticket (Republican), 1864; New Jersey Ballot, 2010: The two-party system is a fixture of the political landscape in the US. Although the Democrat and Republican parties have experienced some changes over time, they remain the parties of choice for most Americans. At left is the National Union Ticket, or Republican ticket, 1864. At right is a

modern-day two-party ballot from New Jersey, 2010.

Although the specific parties have shifted several times over the last 250 years, we have consistently had two major parties competing for power in the United States. Why is this the case? The two-party system in the US is not an inherent feature of our political culture, but is actually an artifact of our electoral system rules. The type of electoral system we use is called a winner-take-all, or “first-past-the-post” model. This means that, however many candidates compete in an electoral contest, the one who receives the most votes wins.

In most cases, because of party primaries, there will be only one Democrat and one Republican competing against each other in the November general election, so the seat is guaranteed to go to one of these two parties. If a minor party candidate or two does appear on the November ballot, they may receive a small share of the vote total, perhaps even five or ten percent, but in a winner-take-all model they have very little chance of ever getting enough votes to win the seat.

Qualified Political Parties in California

A more common electoral system model throughout the world is based on proportional representation (PR). In a PR system, the central government is usually called a parliament, and seats are awarded to parties based on their percentage share of the overall vote. There are several variations on this model, based on whether voters cast votes for individual candidates or for the party, but the PR model tends to result in multi-party systems because it is much easier for small parties to have their members elected to parliament in this type of political system.

Countries Across the World that use Proportional Representation

It is unlikely that the United States will shift away from the winner-take-all model, so we are likely to see the continuation of a two-party system. However, the specific two parties in that

system have shifted several times over the course of US history, and there is no guarantee that the Democratic and Republican parties will hold their places as our major parties forever. If either of these parties is unable to hold together its coalition of loyal voters and a new party emerges that is more successful at gaining the support of a broad segment of the American electorate, we could see another party shift with one of these parties being displaced. The US continues to experience ongoing demographic changes, including a growing number of Hispanic American and Asian American voters. This, along with more liberal political attitudes among younger voters, particularly on social issues, means that both the Democratic and Republican parties need to strategize about how to attract and keep new generations of voters loyal.