The U.S. President Should be Elected by Popular Vote
CON (3 arguments)
Links to more CON research:
Why keep the electoral college?
This is a U.S. government site that provides several reasons for maintaining the electoral college. An opposition team could use the historical arguments to explain that the current system is key to democracy.
Grabbers:
1) A Washington Post poll found in 2000 after the Bush victory that 6 out of 10 would prefer a popular vote system.
2) These are the results for the 2000 election:
George Bush---50,456,002 votes nationwide 47.87% of total vote
Al Gore---50,999,897 votes nationwide 48.38% of total vote
Others---3,949,201 votes nationwide 3.75% of total vote
In the statistic, it is clear that the largest number of voters voted for Gore. Due mainly to the workings of the Electoral College, their candidate was not elected. In a direct voting system, where the president is chosen by popular vote alone, such a scenario would not arise, as there would be no mechanism to obstruct the voters from selecting the candidate that the largest number of them thought worthy.
Direct popular vote should not replace the electoral college because it is a step of democratization for the United States. Joe Wolverton author of The New American says, "any democratization of the presidential election process is an affront to the express intent of our Founders. The men who constructed our federal government zealously guarded against permitting the harmful influence of democracy to infect the inner workings of our nation." The United States should not taking steps towards democracy because America is not a democracy for good reason. Alexander Hamilton once said, "We are a Republican government, real liberty is never found in despotism of the extremes of democracy." Any form of democracy within the U.S is not desirable. The John Birch Society's documentary, Overview of America, affirms this by saying, "Democracy itself is not a stable form of government, instead it is the gradual transition from a limited government to the unlimited rule of an oligarchy." Any form of democracy is not desirable because it assists in the gradual destruction of a republican government like that of the United States and turns it into a governmental rule of the few that denies individual liberties.
According to Kristina Dell, "with a direct popular vote...the selection of the president would often be the biggest, most populous states with little attention paid to smaller ones." Without the electoral college the voices of small states would be drowned out by the larger ones. Bob Nutting of the Maine House Republicans says, "In the election of 2008, because all votes in the electoral college are important, Maine saw candidates and their surrogates. If the criteria for winning were the popular vote, they would have camped out in California, Texas, New York, Florida and other populous states." This is sourced from CNN article, Electoral College Explained. The electoral college is a necessity in order to give small states the right to have a voice in presidential elections which is why I urge a negative ballot for today's debate.
"Without a two-party competition, it would almost be impossible to win a true sizable plurality of at least forty percent. Compromises and concessions would vanish, and a candidate could represent all fifty states by winning the vote with a minimal plurality. True representation would cease to exist because it would not be needed to win. Instead, a minority party could represent a select group with large numbers and disregard the many important compromises needed to gain these votes under a two party system.
Instead of the landslide victories requires by the electoral college (Half of the electoral votes, plus one) with DPV the winning candidate is whoever gains the most votes--even if that doesn't constitute a majority. The minority president disadvantage is more likely to occur under DPV than the status quo.