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Quotable
Quotes
“…every member must have an equal and
effective opportunity to vote, and all votes must be counted as
equal.”
Robert
Dahl - leading democratic theorist
“…for two centuries supporters of the
Electoral College have built their arguments on a series of faulty
premises. The Electoral College is a gross violation of the cherished
value of political equality. At
the same time, it does not protect the interests of small states or
racial minorities, nor does it serve as a bastion of federalism.
Instead the Electoral College distorts the presidential
campaign so that candidates ignore most small states – and many
large ones – and pay little attention to minorities.”
George C. Edwards III
– leading scholar of the U.S. Presidency; member of Texas A&M
since 1978, author: Why the Electoral College is Bad for America
“We preserve a system of electing a President
which contains so many built-in pitfalls that sooner or later it is
bound to destroy us.”
James A.
Michener, The
Presidential Lottery
“…arguing that our endurance as a
democratic republic is tied to the Electoral College would be
tantamount to having claimed in 1915 that our stability was
dependent on continuing to deny women the right to vote and to have
state legislatures select U.S. Senators.”
Rob
Richie, Executive
Director, The Center for Voting & Democracy
“We must place the election of the President
directly in the hands of the American people. By abolishing
the Electoral College, we force the candidates to reach out to all
people and encourage voter participation. When the voters know
their vote will be counted, they will feel a direct link, a desire
and a responsibility to go to the polls and voice their opinion.”
Rep. Brian Baird,
(D-WA)
“Every citizen’s vote should count in
America, not just the votes of partisan insiders in the Electoral
College. The Electoral College was necessary when communications were
poor, literacy was low and voters lacked information about
out-of-state figures, which is clearly no longer the case.”
Rep. Gene Green,
(D-TX)
“The franchise then was the landed white
elite, at a time when there was a general distrust of the population
at large. “Women were
not allowed to vote. African Americans were not allowed to vote. You
had to own land. This is clearly a different time. Candidates are
not restricted to campaigning by geography, or lack of
communication.”
Rep. William Delahunt,
(D-MA)
"You
win some, you lose some. And then there's that little-known third
category."
Al Gore, 2004 Democratic National Convention, in reference to winning the
popular vote and losing the Electoral College in 2000
The
Electoral College is a "hastily sketched system" that
"was obsolete within a bare decade of its inauguration."
Jack Rakove, Stanford historian, premier Constitutional Convention
scholar
“I wrote in defense of the Electoral College
in 2000, but George Edwards III, a political scientist at Texas
A&M University, has forced me to reconsider. Upon
reconsideration, I think the critics have the better argument.
If the Electoral College didn't exist, no one would invent
it. It violates the central principle of our election system -- that
every vote should count equally and that victory should go to the
person with the most votes. And it produces no obvious compensating
benefit.
Steve Chapman, nationally syndicated columnist, Chicago
Tribune
"I
think it's unhealthy now the way the campaigns are run.
California, it's the most populous state in the country and
Bush and Kerry are staying away....I'd be surprised if Kerry goes
into Texas."
Bill Dooling, Massachusetts state elector, in reference to the greater
campaign attention received by swing states
"I am opposed to eliminating the Electoral
College. That would
throw the election to a few states, and it would seem to me that
candidates would campaign in just a few states."
Tom Crowson, confused Republican challenger to Rep. Brain
Baird in 2004
The
current system "violates the one-person, one-vote rule.
It's essential to representative government to get it
changed."
Kay Maxwell, president of the League of Women Voters
“A
scrapping or even the tweaking of the electoral college should be
driven by the long-term national interest, not the political
calculation of partisans in any particular state.”
San Francisco Chronicle,
09/23/04
“All-or-nothing
systems disenfranchise millions of voters and prompt campaigns to
focus solely on closely contested states. This year, the candidates
are ignoring two-thirds of the states because all of the electoral
votes in each appear safely in one or the other's camp. So certain
an outcome discourages turnout in those states as well.
Though the system dates back to the 19th century under laws
adopted by each state, it doesn't have to be that way. Certainly,
the U.S. Constitution doesn't require it.”
USA Today, 9/19/04
“We've said it before, and we'll say it again
- the American Electoral College system sucks.
All told, the Bush and Kerry campaigns have spent well over
$200 million by now, sending tens of thousands of advertising spots
to Iowa television stations. We
merit this attention because, simply put, we are special, or at
least our state is…This makes us worthy of the kind of time
investment you don't normally see unless somebody is building a rain
forest next door.”
The Daily Iowan,
09/23/04 (Iowa is a 2004 swing state)
“In the early years
of our nation’s history, the people who made up the populations of
their state had similar ideas and beliefs. Many identified with
their state before their country. This is why the power in this
country is divided between the federal and state governments.
Today, many people share the same values of those living at
opposite ends of the country, rather than with those who reside in
their own state. Think about the difference between urban and rural
lifestyles.”
American
Daily, 09/25/04
“…there will always be a party, or an
interest, or a political figure, who will see opportunity in the
peculiarities of the system. And
the opponents will inevitably wrap themselves in the old arguments
of the sanctity of the states and will, disingenuously or not,
summon arguments about the prerogatives of the smaller states.
Political bedfellows sometimes are strange indeed. But so, too, is
the system we have.”
David M. Shribman
“As the Gallup Poll reported in 2001, ‘There
is little question that the American public would prefer to
dismantle the Electoral College system, and go to a direct popular
vote for the presidency. In Gallup polls that stretch back over 50 years, a majority
of Americans have continually expressed support for the notion of an
official amendment of the U.S. Constitution that would allow for
direct election of the president.’ If members of Congress were to
pass a law [today] that established a system that counted the votes
of citizens in certain states more than the votes of citizens of
other states, there can be little doubt that those members
supporting such a law would have brief legislative careers.”
George C. Edwards III, Why the Electoral College is Bad
for America
“I have ever considered the constitutional
mode of election…as the most dangerous blot on our constitution,
and one which some unlucky chance will some day hit.”
Thomas Jefferson, 1823, after surviving the first
contingent election
“The present rule of voting for
President…is so great a departure from the Republican principle of
numerical equality…and is so pregnant also with a mischievous
tendency in practice, that an amendment of the Constitution on this
point is justly called for by all its considerate and best
friends.”
James Madison
“The objections to this…election of a
President need only to be stated, not argued.
First, its manifest injustice.
In such an election each state is to have but one vote.
Nevada, with its 42,000 population, has an equal vote with
New York, having 104 time as great a population.
It is a mockery to call such an election just, fair or
republican.”
Senator Oliver P. Morton
of Indiana, 1873
“Can we forget for whom we are forming a
government? Is it for men,
or for the imaginary beings called States?”
James Wilson, author of U.S. Constitution
“…the President is to
act for the people not for States.”
James Madison
"It's
a ridiculous setup, which thwarts the will of the majority, distorts
presidential campaigning and has the potential to produce a true
constitutional crisis…The majority does not rule, and every vote
is not equal — those are reasons enough for scrapping the
system."
The New York Times,
08/29/04
"I believe strongly that in a democracy,
we should respect the will of the people, and to me, that means
it’s time to do away with the Electoral College and move to the
popular election of our president."
Hillary Rodham Clinton
"‘Majority rule’ is a basic tenet of
democracy. The Electoral College … fail[s] this test. Let’s send
a message to American voters that it is their votes, and their votes
alone, that count when electing our leaders."
John B.
Anderson, Chairman, The Center for Voting and
Democracy
"The entire election is being driven by Electoral College math."
Jim Boren, Fresno Bee 10/01/04
"Why should voters in two thirds of the states not be part of the presidential campaign? They have the same needs as voters in battleground states. They should be heard on the war in Iraq, the economy and the failing health care system. But they are ignored because they happen to live in states that have long since decided their presidential preferences."
Jim Boren,
Fresno Bee 10/01/04
"There's a better system, and the Electoral College isn't part of it."
Jim Boren, Fresno Bee 10/01/04
"The Electoral College is an 18th-century anachronism that, if not abolished, should at least be amended so that presidential elections more closely reflect the will of the majority."
The Modesto Bee, 10/01/04
"It is one of the ironies of the 21st century that presidential elections in an Internet era can be decided by the Electoral College, a system set up in the 1780s by men who traveled on horseback and by clipper ship."
The Providence Journal, 10/02/04
"...the
current system discourages voter turnout. Why bother to vote if your
state always goes for the party you don't support?"
Rosemary Roberts,
columnist, News & Record
"[With Electoral College reform], think of the possibilities: Kerry in a cowboy hat, Bush in a Starbucks; candidates would have to become deeper and more dynamic and the national debate would be more robust."
Ben Gruenbaum, The Cornell Daily Sun, October 07, 2004
"The
choice of the chief executive must be the people's, and it should
rest with none other than them."
George C. Edwards III, Why the Electoral College is Bad
for America
"I suspect this whole electoral college issue is
due for serious debate in the next Congress."
David Broder, Washington Post
"Amendment 36 is not a radical idea. It is
an old idea that seeks to restore representative government to the
people."
Julie Brown, Campaign Director, Make Your Vote Count
"On
a national basis, [direct election] means you have to campaign
everywhere, and ultimately that brings us together."
Rick Ridder, Ridder-Braden Inc. "...this bizarre
system" makes candidates invisible in some states when
"you can hardly get them out of your living room in
Columbus."
Peter Shane, law professor, Ohio State University "My
view is that we need to change the system. And that means amending
the Constitution. Because we have this winner take all
system...as the campaign progresses, and [as] more states move into
an almost certain Democratic, or almost certain Republican category,
the candidates are driven to go to those states that could go either
way."
Thomas Mann, senior fellow in American governance, Brookings
Institute "...let's
remember, the first step in solving a problem is admitting you have
one."
CBS News, October 24, 2004 "Colorado
could be this year's Florida, unless Ohio is this year's Florida, or
New Mexico or Pennsylvania or Iowa, or unless Florida is this year's
Florida."
CBS News, October 24, 2004 "The
system designed to ensure a wider field of vision from candidates
has narrowed it to unacceptable limits."
CBS
News, October 24, 2004 "The
Electoral College is a political wisdom tooth - a historical relic
that stays largely out of sight yet causes no small pain when it
pops up."
Matthew Daneman, Democrat and Chronicle
"From
the time I was small, I learned that every vote counted, that we
actually chose the president directly. They build up your patriotism by saying we can elect
whoever we want, and then you find out later it doesn't work that
way. I think it's wrong to tell kids it's one person, one
vote. It's a huge lie."
Philip
Dale, 13, studying the electoral college in his eighth-grade
civics class
"The
electoral college was not the result of a coherent design based on
clear political principles but, rather, a complex compromise [at the
Constitutional Convention] that reflected the interests of different
states."
George C. Edwards III, author, Why the Electoral College is
Bad for America
"People think of [the Electoral College] as
somewhere between bad and stupid. But that's been true for 50
years."
Alexander Keyssar, Harvard University
history professor
"We're advocating democracy around the
world. Are we suggesting to anyone they have an electoral
college?"
Rep. Jim Leach
"Why
is it that the people of Afghanistan can vote directly for the
Afghanistan president, unlike Americans, who cannot vote directly
for the American president? Why is it that Iraqis can vote for their
president, but Americans cannot vote for the American
president? If the
Electoral College is so important in America, then shouldn't
Afghanistan have an Electoral College? Shouldn't Iraq have an
Electoral College? The answer is that they don't because it's not
relevant."
Anthony Medina, The Seattle Times
"Many democracies around the world have
copied the American system; none has copied the Electoral
College."
Star Tribune Editorial, October 31, 2004
"The
ramifications of the trend toward battleground-only campaigns shake
the foundation of our democracy. As long as the Electoral College
system remains unchanged, the citizens who live in the Red and the
Blue states will never be engaged by either party. The alarming
apathy of our population will only continue to grow."
Ben Hughes, the Daily Texan, October 26, 2004
"Electoral
proponents claim it's federalism in action, protecting the interests
of small states and minorities. But...the Senate better protects
small states, and the Electoral College only minimizes minorities.
America's highest concentration of blacks lives in the Deep South
and votes in bloc for Democrats, but gets consistently nullified by
white majorities who vote Republican."
Jim Rossi, San Francisco Chronicle, October 17, 2004
"For a while there, I thought that maybe George W. Bush and
John Kerry may need Electoral votes from the swing state of
Australia to help break [a] tie."
Channel News Asia International, November 5, 2004
"The electoral college method of electing a president of the
United States is archaic, undemocratic, complex, ambiguous,
indirect, and dangerous."
American Bar Association, 1967
Electoral College Table of Contents
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