The Electoral College

Most people immediately think about more interesting things and tune out the world when they hear the words "Electoral College," and I can't blame them.  It's a topic that gets glossed over with generalizations and the path of least resistance is often to consider it outdated in spite of its use today.

A brief-brief summary is the Electoral College is a group of representatives who vote based on the popular vote you cast (best-known example being presidential elections).  It's based on a winner-take-all system, so if you voted against the majority, your vote simply doesn't make an impact on the overall election.  Sounds crazy right?  Kind of makes you wonder why we still have it.  It's old and doesn't make sense today, right?

Bear with me while I attempt to bring us past that point where normally people go dead to the world hearing Charlie Brown's teacher.

In other words, the Electoral College is a clever check against the majority.  Wait what?  I know what you're thinking, I JUST said it kicked the minority votes out.  This remains true, but it's actually not designed to protect the minority within the state (or commonwealth).  Its design allows protection for the majority within the state against the national majority.

The best example I can give here is a fictional one: let's say the United States is made up of two states of equal population split right down the middle of the country.  This would give them equal electoral votes, as well.

Let's say the state on the left has a unanimous voting population.  And the state on the right has a very close division, but the majority votes against the left.  What the Electoral College does is protects the interest of the popular minority.  How cool is that?  I know, I know.  Not a huge improvement on the textbook version, but if minority rights or states' rights are important to you, now you know that the Electoral College is working for you!