Electoral College Broken

0
501

Dear Editor:

In light of the results of the presidential elections of 2016 and 2020 there has come a call in the national media to abandon the Electoral College as confused and  outdated, while adopting presidential election by direct popular vote. This idea was seriously considered by the Philadelphia Convention of 1787, but in the final analysis they adopted the more complex mode of Electors to select the President of the United States. Anyone interested in the rationale behind this should read Alexander Hamilton in Federalist #68; easily found online and very easy to read. As a delegate from New York to the Philadelphia Convention, Mr. Hamilton gives us an insider’s view of the underlying reasoning behind this mode of selection.

The main problem today is that America has done the Electoral College so wrong for so long that the errors of this system as practiced have become de facto changes to the U.S. Constitution. The Achilles heel in this system is that it assumes a general voting population that is educated, trained, aware and involved at the State levels so that only those people most mature, experienced, impartial and trustworthy of service would be selected as Electors for that State. Unfortunately, We the People have been asleep at the wheel for well over 100 years, rousing ourselves to semi-consciousness every four years for the general elections. This has allowed partisan party politics to govern the selection of Electors and the operation of the Colleges in each State for presidential selection, virtually guaranteeing that only Democratic and Republican Party candidates will receive any consideration at all by the Electoral Colleges of the several States.

I don’t believe that the Electoral College method of selecting the President of the United States can be correctly done in modern America. Straying far from the original pathway we are now at the point where the Electoral College method needs to be scrapped and the selection of the President done by general popular vote. But be aware that this method exposes us to all of the problems and dangers mentioned by Mr. Hamilton in Federalist #68.

I read an article today about Hillary Clinton and New York Governor Andrew Cuomo casting their Electoral College ballots for Joe Biden. Their selection as Electors underscores my comments regarding the depth of error in the modern operation of the Electoral College. Neither should have been selected as Electors. Hillary is the very personification of a partisan Party politician who can make no claim to impartiality. Gov. Cuomo should have been passed over simply because he is a governmental office holder. Again, he cannot be impartial in his vote. The Electoral College process is broken beyond any repair.

Brian Bloedel, Accomac

Previous articleDonnie Wayne Tyndall Memorial Toy Drive Delivers Christmas Cheer
Next articleSuggested Biden Moniker: ‘His Fraudulency’