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Majority of Americans continue to favor moving away from Electoral College
(www.pewresearch.org)
this post was submitted on 30 Jul 2024
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I get that the Electoral College was originally designed to give smaller states an equal say. But, when Los Angeles county has more population than like 10 states combined, things are getting ridiculous.
California has like 67 times the population of Wyoming... yet they each have two senators. And that keeps increasing.
Our government is not a good representation of the populace.
The number of people was a political compromise between individual rights and States rights, but so was a Senate and House.
The electoral college was primarily designed to enable states to vote despite a communication delay that could take months.
It did great at that, actually. How would California have up to date info on what's going on in Washington when the fastest mode of travel was a horse? It wouldn't.
Instead of voting based on information that's outdated and potentially inaccurate, best to pick some people you trust to vote in your interests, and send them to Washington. Let them get caught up, and vote how they will as your representative.
Then States can sort out their own voting time and method, with no real concern for it being simultaneous or consistent because news travels so slow anyway. The important thing was authorized people would show up by the expected federal voting time, and if that happened, everyone did well enough.
Of course, now they can cast their vote without leaving the state, and coordination is possible, but here we are holding the bag on a lack of accounting for technological progress.
I agree with your ultimate premise, that technological advances have all but eliminated the need for the Ec. But, my man, the telegraph predates CA as a state.
The EC was also for many reasons, but pertaining to the point were talking about, it was because they were afraid people would just campaign in cities because that would be the most efficient. The EC forces a wider appeal.
But with the ability to reach everyone, everywhere, instantly, this fear that they only campaign in cities is gone.
Also, the electoral college only shifts the focus from cities to major swing states (and even then, cities within those states).
But more importantly, why the fuck should potential campaign strategies affect the strength of my vote?