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Electoral College: Should it stay or go?


oldtimer

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13 minutes ago, jjptkd said:

How is that fair at all?

it is fair , because States can have more population , and  , once they do , the vote changes , it's all about  residents and votes , the formula is good ,  but you have to equal the playing  field first , by boosting the population in less populated States   to  balance the vote equally , that will happen one day , but the Country is still Young -

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+ for Electoral College since I don't want big city people that cant figure out what they are telling me what I need, or have to do, way out in the country. The reason it was created was so cities could not dominate areas they did not live in by votes alone and where people do not want to live and act like city slickers do. The vast majority of the USA outside of urban areas does not want to be like Chicago, LA, NY NY, Portland or Detroit.

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The USA was set up as a Republic because the Founding Fathers well understood the tyranny that votes alone have always ended up with. Eventually people discover unearned and undeserved plunder forcibly taken from their neighbors by the power of majority votes and satisfaction in telling their fellow men what they HAVE to do and then it all ends in trouble. Always. The USA was not created as nor is it a Democracy thankfully and that makes it much harder for those who want dictatorial control and freebies.

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1 hour ago, MyOwn said:

 

Lock this now. it's all political

 

This is a political discussion we are talking about government politics? 

 

It cracks me up when a topic like this comes up where you have an "A" or "B" situation and each viewpoint pretty much always goes along party lines so voicing your opinion is almost certainly going to expose your political leanings and when someone voices an opposing viewpoint someone from the other side cries about it??

 

Lock her up! I mean lock it up! that was an accidentally slip sorry.

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19 hours ago, Dave A said:

+ for Electoral College since I don't want big city people that cant figure out what they are telling me what I need, or have to do, way out in the country. The reason it was created was so cities could not dominate areas they did not live in by votes alone and where people do not want to live and act like city slickers do. The vast majority of the USA outside of urban areas does not want to be like Chicago, LA, NY NY, Portland or Detroit.

Technically not true.  That is the de facto effect, however,  The college was created to elect the executive branch.  Remember, as you of course understand, that is the only vote that counts.  There is no right for anyone to vote in the constitution other than the electoral college.  The commoner was never meant to have any real power of the vote, no matter where they lived.  Return to the link I posted about what the constitution does not say about the right to vote.  I am not arguing against its existence, but let's all get things straight if possible.  Backwards looking logic does little to enhance understanding.  According to Article II, Section 1, Clause 2 of the Constitution, each state legislature determines the manner by which its state's electors are chosen. The number of each state's electors is equal to the sum of the state's membership in the Senate and House of Representatives.  

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16 minutes ago, oldtimer said:

The number of each state's electors is equal to the sum of the state's membership in the Senate and House of Representatives.  

This is the end result and all that matters.  If the article I referenced earlier is correct, no election was ever decided by faithless electors.

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Good point.  The constitution leaves it up to the states how to choose electors.  There would be no such thing as "faithless" electors without state laws determining such.  Jeff, yes the practical point is how many electors each state is assigned.  True to consistency with the representation by population of the states, plus two senators for Congress, it ties together the document as a framework for the nation.  To me, it does matter why, because otherwise we eventually end up like children in the outback telling tales of the before times.  The composition of the college has everything to do with state populations (not voter populations), and was not as some would posit a city mouse versus country mouse solution.  This is made obvious with how the population was to be counted, and who had the vote.    Remember, slaves were counted as a percentage to boost representation of some states, when no one in their right mind would argue that the slaves themselves would be represented, or could possibly vote.

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15 hours ago, oldtimer said:

and was not as some would posit a city mouse versus country mouse solution.

It sort-of is.  The part about the 2 senators wasn't for the sake of senators.  It was to level the field between agrarian states and states with large cities.  You could say based on "population," and that would practically be a synonym.  They don't build skyscrapers on farms.

 

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2 hours ago, Jeff Matthews said:

It sort-of is.  The part about the 2 senators wasn't for the sake of senators.  It was to level the field between agrarian states and states with large cities.  You could say based on "population," and that would practically be a synonym.  They don't build skyscrapers on farms.

 

They didn't build skyscrapers at all back then.  Practically a synonym, maybe, but the point is population, not city/country.  If the whole population of NYC for example, all moved to Alaska (yes an anachronism), then all of a sudden that state would gain a whole lot more representation, even if they spread themselves out in that massive land without congregating in cities.  The part about senators in the legislative branch was to level the field in a higher body of representation than the house, which not only gave the less populous states an even representation, but gave every state equal representation.  It still really wasn't about agrarian or not, since back then most of the country was agrarian.  Again refer to the slavery population question.  Those with the vote in those states wanted to boost their representation through a percentage in the census of all humans in the state, not just the voting humans.  Think on that.  The point is it was not based on voting population.  Theoretically it isn't now, either.

 

Note the lack of city mouse/country mouse:

https://www.thoughtco.com/great-compromise-of-1787-3322289

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