Life without the electoral college

I would like to have the vocabulary, the skill, the talent to properly explain to America the absolute necessity of a Judeo-Christian ethos if a nation is to govern itself by means of a constitutional republic.

Do not think that what we have in America is a democracy. It is not—not as most people understand democracy. Under a pure democratic government, the majority rules.

It is not a slip of the tongue or an ill-considered comment when Hillary Clinton, AOC and other Democrats call for the abolition of the Electoral College.

Why was the Electoral College set up, in the first place?

When the U S Constitution was adopted—indeed, in order to persuade all of the colonies to join in this experiment in self-rule—some concessions had to be made by those colonies with larger populations.

To liken it to the present day, let us suppose that we have a pure democracy wherein the majority rules. All it takes to win an election is to allow all persons over 18 to vote, count every vote, and the winner would be the one who received the most votes.

Nothing wrong with that, you say.

Except . . . This may sound like a fairy tale that could never happen in the real world, but humor me for a few moments.

Let us assume that politicians of the Republican Party offered every resident of the states of California, Florida and Texas a floor of income under which their pay would never fall. That income would provide enough money to live very well, regardless of what kind of work you pursued. Say, $350,000 for each family of four whose eligible members voted Republican. Your income could go up, but it would never be reduced. We are going to be able to afford this generous amount for Republicans by taxing the pants off citizens of non-Republican states, particularly all the wealthy in those states.

If the Republicans could win just a super majority in the above three states, they would not even have to campaign in the other forty-seven, and any laws passed in the U S Congress would of necessity be submitted by a Representative or Senator from Texas, Florida or California.  Otherwise, the bill had not a prayer of passing.

That’s unfair! You say.

I can’t argue that. But how many recipients of the largesse Floridians would be paid would vote to reduce the level of their own remuneration, or to change the rules? 1%? 3%? I’m dreaming.

After four years of the corrupt Biden administration, you cannot doubt that such a scenario is possible!

Everything was much different when our nation was new. An income tax had not yet been introduced. All the smaller states had to fear from those states larger than themselves was that those more populous would impose the laws that suited them, and not be as concerned about what the others wanted. The colony of Virginia had almost three-quarters of a million citizens, Pennsylvania almost a half-million and Massachusetts a little more than a third of a million. Contrasted with that, Delaware had only 59, 094 and Rhode Island 68, 625. Were these smaller states to trust in the goodwill of the larger; hope that they would afford them fair treatment?

No. First, the Constitution provided that the number of Representatives each state had was commensurate with their proportion of the nation’s population—the more citizens you had, the more Representatives you could send to Congress. THAT caused a furor, only to be tempered by an agreement that all colonies would have two Senators each. Initially, those Senators were selected by their home-state legislators. In 1912, Congress voted to have Senators selected by popular election, and that became law upon ratification in April of 1913. The Seventeenth Amendment replaced Article 1, Section 3, clauses 1 and 2 of the U S Constitution.

While Representatives had to stand for election every two years, members of the so-called ‘upper house’ served for six years. It was assumed that the Senate would be the more deliberative body; taking their time so that the influence of cooler heads might temper the sometimes more radical legislation presented by the House of Representatives. The bills from either chamber would be reconciled by members selected for that purpose, and the emended bill hopefully passed.

You will have observed how calm, cool and collected Chuck Schumer and Bernie Sanders are. Okay, so it is not a universally accepted truth about ‘cooler heads’.

As to the current popularity  of the electoral college . . . Do you suppose the Democrats will be as eager for its dissolution after Tom Homan, Trump’s new Border Czar, has deported all the illegal immigrants?

Probably not. See you next week.