Suppose the Electoral College in Dec Works as the Founders Intended

[longknife]

As we all know, it's delegates to the Electoral College that chose the president, not the voters. The founders intended that states sent delegates to Washington to chose a president. The constitution leaves the method of selection of delegates to the states. All states have setup their election laws so voters aren't really voting for the candidate but for a delegate chosen to select the president. State laws differ but the selected delegates are almost always well respected members of the winning candidate's party, delegates that will faithfully carry out the wish of the voters. Basically they are the party establishment often delegates to the convention, state party leaders, and previous office holders.

Now suppose Trump wins the general election by a narrow margin and we have some faithless electors who refuse to vote for him throwing the vote to Clinton. Only about half of of our states have faithless elector laws to punish and/or replace them. I don't see how the Supreme Court could do anything. Even if they did, what could they do? Once the electors vote, what can the states do?

This assumes a lot; the least plausible of course being that Herr Drumpf could win more than 100 electoral votes.

Of course it does but my point is that it should not be possible for a group of faithless electors to decide the presidency. All it would take to eliminate this possibility would be for all the states to have faithless elector legislation that disqualify any elector that fail to honor their pledge. Of course the Electoral College would have no purpose.

They could just eliminate the electors altogether, and have the popular vote in each state automatically decide where the votes go. It seems like a holdover from before the information age.

That being the case, let's just switch to online registration and voting run by the same outfit that did it in Utah.

 

[JakeStarkey]

As we all know, it's delegates to the Electoral College that chose the president, not the voters. The founders intended that states sent delegates to Washington to chose a president. The constitution leaves the method of selection of delegates to the states. All states have setup their election laws so voters aren't really voting for the candidate but for a delegate chosen to select the president. State laws differ but the selected delegates are almost always well respected members of the winning candidate's party, delegates that will faithfully carry out the wish of the voters. Basically they are the party establishment often delegates to the convention, state party leaders, and previous office holders.

Now suppose Trump wins the general election by a narrow margin and we have some faithless electors who refuse to vote for him throwing the vote to Clinton. Only about half of of our states have faithless elector laws to punish and/or replace them. I don't see how the Supreme Court could do anything. Even if they did, what could they do? Once the electors vote, what can the states do?

This assumes a lot; the least plausible of course being that Herr Drumpf could win more than 100 electoral votes.

Of course it does but my point is that it should not be possible for a group of faithless electors to decide the presidency. All it would take to eliminate this possibility would be for all the states to have faithless elector legislation that disqualify any elector that fail to honor their pledge. Of course the Electoral College would have no purpose.

I can hear our GOP screaming about ballot stuffing.
They could just eliminate the electors altogether, and have the popular vote in each state automatically decide where the votes go. It seems like a holdover from before the information age.

That being the case, let's just switch to online registration and voting run by the same outfit that did it in Utah.

 

[Flopper]

As we all know, it's delegates to the Electoral College that chose the president, not the voters. The founders intended that states sent delegates to Washington to chose a president. The constitution leaves the method of selection of delegates to the states. All states have setup their election laws so voters aren't really voting for the candidate but for a delegate chosen to select the president. State laws differ but the selected delegates are almost always well respected members of the winning candidate's party, delegates that will faithfully carry out the wish of the voters. Basically they are the party establishment often delegates to the convention, state party leaders, and previous office holders.

Now suppose Trump wins the general election by a narrow margin and we have some faithless electors who refuse to vote for him throwing the vote to Clinton. Only about half of of our states have faithless elector laws to punish and/or replace them. I don't see how the Supreme Court could do anything. Even if they did, what could they do? Once the electors vote, what can the states do?

This assumes a lot; the least plausible of course being that Herr Drumpf could win more than 100 electoral votes.

Of course it does but my point is that it should not be possible for a group of faithless electors to decide the presidency. All it would take to eliminate this possibility would be for all the states to have faithless elector legislation that disqualify any elector that fail to honor their pledge. Of course the Electoral College would have no purpose.

They could just eliminate the electors altogether, and have the popular vote in each state automatically decide where the votes go. It seems like a holdover from before the information age.

It was a hold over from a time in which governments believed that the people could not be trusted to select their leaders.

Although colonist did vote, a qualification system was used that restricted the voting to adult free males, members of the predominate religious group and those that owned land worth a certain amount.

After eliminating those under 21, women, slaves, those that did not own sufficient property, most Catholics and Jews, only 10% to 20% of the population was allowed to vote. Even with this select group of voters, many of the founders still did not trust them to select the president.

BRIA 8 1 b Who Voted in Early America? - Constitutional Rights Foundation