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Summary A-Level Edexcel Paper 3 US Elections notes
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A-Level Edexcel Paper 3 US Elections with examples
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5. US democracy and participation5.1 Electoral systems in the USA
The Electoral College
Constitutional basis:
Established by Article II, Section 1 of the Constitution, the electoral college is created once every four years for
the sole purpose of electing the president and vice president. Each state is allocated a number of electors
determining by combining the number of congressional representatives a state has at minimum one with the
senators to together with the three votes from Washington DC. Electors typically hold a leadership position
within the party and almost without exception pledge themselves to vote for a specific a candidate. Thus, in
voting for an elector pledged to Obama in 2008 voters were enough activating footballer to be president. 99%
of electors in US history have voted as pledged. The electors meet in the various state capitols on the Monday
after the second Wednesday in December - and send the results to the VP, who formally counts them and
announces the result to join a session of Congress in early January.
This should be a mere formality, but on two occasions in the 21st century, this was not the case
2000:
Al Gore won 48.4% of the popular vote compared to 47.9% for Bush but lost the electoral college vote
by 266 two 271 based on the Florida resort being allowed to stand. Florida’s electoral college votes were
pivotal in determining which candid it got through the 270 threshold needed to win the White House. The
situation could only be resolved by ruling in the US Supreme Court. Both the very fact that nine unelected
Supreme Court Justices effectively decided the outcome of the election and the very nature of the ruling itself
were highly controversial.
Media estimates suggest that as many as 180,000 Florida ballots were cast but not counted. Gore’s complaint
was that the voting machines read only those pallets which had clear holes punched in them and did not read
those that had a chad (a small tab left dangling from the whole) even though it was perfectly clear to the human
eye what are the voters’ intention had been. In the certified vote on November 26 Bush would go fighter 537
votes in a total of 5.8 million. The argument about where the one ballot paper could be included raged on until
December 12th.
On that day US Supreme Court ruled 7 to 2 that the manual recounts violated the 14 th Amendment equal
protection guarantees because Florida did not have a uniform standard between the individual counties of the
state for evaluating the vote when the voting machines were unclear.
But it then roared 5 to 4 that it was now too late to improve the procedure in time to comply with the deadlines
for setting up the electoral college of the election process should cease, and the existing result should stand.
The fact that the five voted for the result to stand were all Republican nominees (Rehnquist, Scalia, Thomas,
,O’Connor, Kennedy) hardly went unnoticed, though of that group O’Connor was usually a swing vote and two
other Republican nominees (Stevens, Souter) voted with two Democrat nominee is (Breyer, Ginsburg).
2020:
Trumps refusal to concede was not altered by the formal talent made in the meeting of the electoral college on
December 14, 2020, after all the states had certified their results in early January 2021, he even tried to
persuade Georgia to change its results after it had been declared in the Electoral College. On 6 th January,
Congress met to confirm the electoral college count and certify it. Trump tried to persuade Vice President Mike
Pence in his constitutional capacity as president of the Senate to block the vote. When Pence refused, Trump
indicated a mob of his supporters to storm the Capitol building. Shaken but unmoved, Congress met into the
early hours of the next morning to certify the result. The following week the House of Representatives
impeached Trump for a second time.
Joe Biden was inaugurated the 46th president of the United States in a ceremony held on the west front of the US
Capitol building. Kamala Harris was sworn as the vice president the first wo first black person and third south
Asian person to hold this office. Donald Trump break with 152 years of desertion by not attending. 2021 was
highly unusual the crowd was very limited due to the pandemic, and I was having a military presence due to the
recent attack.
Distribution of ECVs
The total number of Electoral College votes is 538 candidate needs at least 270 to win the election.
The biggest states in terms of Electoral College votes based on the allocation following the 2010 census:
California 55, Texas 38, Florida 29, New York 29, and in Illinois and Pennsylvania, 20.
The smallest on the minimum of three were: Alaska, Delaware, North Dakota, South Dakota, Vermont and
Wyoming.
The number of Electoral College votes per state may change after each sentence to reflect changes in population
for example adjustment made as a result of the 2010 sentences reduced New York’s electoral college votes by
two and Ohio’s by to Texas can you floor and Florida game two.
Except in Maine and Nebraska which are proportional the presidential candidate who wins a majority of
votes in each state wins all of the electoral college votes for that state.
In almost every election in US history of the popular vote and E-series have gone the same way and the
electoral college has simply been accepted as a given but controversy is generated when there is an anomalous
result in which the popular vote acoustic country is that out with a result of the electoral college vote. This has
happened in the 2016 and 2000. However, in 2000 the real issue at stake was how votes in Florida were
counted; had they been counted properly, it is likely that Gore would’ve won and there would have been no
debate on the merits of the electoral college system. 2016 offered no such solace - it was unequivocally
anomalous.
Strengths of the EC
Federalism and States Rights are respected because each state makes its own choice for president
known; this is preferable to a nationwide, single vote, in which the voters in thinly populated states
would be lost in the mass.
It tends to produce a two-horse race in which the winner stands every chance of securing over 50% of
the popular vote. This allows the President a clear mandate, which is significant for his roles as Head of
State, Commander in Chief and Chief Executive
It ensures that even small states can have a significant impact on the outcome of elections. For example,
Obama campaigned extensively in the swing state Iowa in 2008 (7 ECVs) as he anticipated it could be
needed to turn the result his way in a close race
It requires candidates to concentrate on all regions of the nation, with their distinct issues and needs
It requires candidates to focus on a range of voting groups – e.g., men have a different pattern of voting
to women, ethnic groups vote differently, old and young, rich and poor, have different interest and
concerns
It usually produces a clear winner, with voters able to see and understand which States each candidate
has won and why. For example, in 1968 Republican Richard Nixon narrowly won the popular voter by
43.3% to Democrat Hubert Humphrey’s 42.7% with neither candidate getting close to a majority.
However, this lead was exaggerated by the ECV vote to produce a clear result by 301 to 191. Given that
Nixon carried 32 states to Humphrey’s 13 plus DC, this was a fairer reflection of how the nation had
voted on a state-by-state basis.
, Weaknesses of the EC
It can produce anomalous results, in which the winner of the popular vote fails to win the presidency.
The 2016 election was the most recent example of this. A major factor in this is the potential for
distortion resulting from the winner-takes-all system used by virtually all states
In recent elections, a pretty clear pattern of red states and blue states has emerged, in which the voting
allegiance of most American states tend to be taken for granted by the parties which control them, and
the voters are demotivated by the sense that their vote will not make any difference, which depresses
turnout.
Because all the states must have at least 3 ECVs, smaller states are overrepresented. If California had
ECVs in proportion to Wyoming it would have 180 rather than 55
In close elections it can give too significant a role to smaller states or to a handful of swing states which
risks distorting the party platforms to suit their particular interests
Equally, it can allow the largest states to dominate – e.g., Florida decided the 2000 election almost
certainly unfairly, lager states which are competitive will attract disproportionate attention, e.g., Ohio in
2012
Electors may sometimes ignore popular wished, for example in the 2016 and 1960 elections. Electors
who do not follow the popular vote are known as faithless electors
Candidates representing minor parties have little prospect of winning any ECVs atall, unless they have
large concentrations of support in particular states, e.g., George Wallace in 1968. In 1992 Ross Perot
won 19% of the popular vote but did not receive a single ECV
What if there was a tie? This scenario is less far-fetched than might first appear. In 2012 it could have
ended 269-269 in a number of scenarios involving the key swing states. For example, if Obama had held
New Hampshire, Ohio, Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania from 2008 while Romney won Colorado,
Florida, Iowa, Nevada, North Carolina and Virginia. Analysts identified up to 32 permutations. Had there
been a tie, the task of electing the president would fall to the newly elected House of Representatives
based on the provisions of the 12th amendment. The vice president would be chosen by the Senate. With
the GOP controlling the House and the Democrats the Senate vote held on purely pass an used a
president Romney Vice President Biden outcome. A democratic legitimacy of such a process of the 21 st-
century would be distinctly dubious.
Recent Examples of Anomalous Results
2016: In keeping with a truly peculiar election season in general, the 2016 Electoral College was untidy, as the
map below indicates. The key point was that Trump won with 304 ECVs, comfortably above the 270 thresholds;
Hillary Clinton received 227. However, Clinton clearly won the popular vote. Trump secured nearly 63 million
votes and a 46% share of the popular vote, but Clinton received 65.8 million votes – almost 3 million more –
and a 48% share (although lots of these were in CA so in many ways, the EC corrected this and represented the
US as a whole). The discrepancy between the popular vote and the Electoral College vote as indicated by the
Election on November 8th, 2016, thrust the role of the Electoral College into the political spotlight.
Another striking feature was that both candidates suffered at the hands of faithless electors who could not
bring themselves to vote for them as the map above shows. One of the Texas electors voted for John Kasich,
another for Ron Paul rather than support Trump; Clinton fared worse – a Hawaii elector voted for Bernie
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