There has been a long-running conversation here, and elsewhere, about whether or not to eliminate the Electoral College. It is my contention that eliminating the Electoral College is foolish, would bring harm and chaos to the electoral system, eliminate minority rights, and increase the divisions in this country.
The main argument made against the EC is that it is not democratic (small d). This is true...by design. We are not, to the chagrin of many, a democracy. We are a democratic republic. This is by design and happens to be a feature, not a bug.
This form of government allows us to balance the passions of the people with the tempering nature of structure. It provides speed bumps along the way, and protections against one group, one faction, one ideology from running rampant over the country. It forces the government, and those who wish to become the government, to meet the needs of ALL factions, not just one or two regional or religious factions that provide a majority time and time again.
I have also read that many states are taken for granted by the various campaigns, and that the election battles are fought primarily in a few battleground states. It is assumed in that analysis that the needs of the "granted" states are not being met, because the political campaigns are laser-focused on the battleground states. This is a short-sighted analysis.
Consider this reality: The reason states are battleground states is not because their needs are more interesting or more likely to be met. The reason they are battleground states is precisely because their needs aren't even identifiable. They're negotiable. They're not clear.
We know what California wants. California wants progress. It always has and always will. In the Reagan era, they went with Reagan (believing that reducing government was progress). Right or wrong, the people of California are now Democrats, largely because their interests lie within the Democratic Party -- the party Californians see as progress. California votes with the Democrats because the Democrats represent their interests.
We know what Texas wants. Texas wants less government and more Christianity. Their needs are met by the Republican Party. The Republicans don't need to campaign there because Texans know what they'll get from the GOP and they turn out to vote for what they're after.
Now tell me, what does Ohio want? What does Virginia want? What does Iowa want? Wisconsin? North Carolina? You can't, because no one knows what those states want. Do they prefer a larger budget with a stronger social net, or a smaller budget with less of a social net? Do they prefer tax cuts be targeted at the poor and middle class, or the wealthy, or some combination? Are they in favor of legal abortion? Drug control? Health care reform?
If we knew, they wouldn't be battleground states. They'd be fairly in the bag for one side or the other. That's why 'swing states" like Michigan and Pennsylvania aren't really swing states -- they're pretty solid Democrat states, even when close. If we knew what the majority of voters in each state wanted, every swing state would look like they do.
What the electoral college does is guarantee that, at a minimum, the needs of all 50 states are considered in Presidential elections. A popular vote contest can ignore Rhode Island or Alaska and focus elsewhere, because the voters simply aren't there. An EC contest makes sure that at least one candidate offers the voters of Rhode Island or Alaska things that meet their political goals, regardless of what they are.
That's why almost every campaign for president involves the following strategy: Embrace your base, push issues they desire that are palpable to the battleground states, and then convince the battleground states that your policies are the ones for them.
Republicans do this from the right, we do this from the left. Whose needs are not addressed in such a scenario? Just because you and I are interested in pushing the country left-ward does not mean that everyone is interested in such a leap. Do Republicans ignore Rhode Island? Of course they do. But Democrats don't, and when they do, they lose. Do Democrats ignore Alabama? Of course they do. But Republicans don't, because they need those votes and they're counting on those votes.
Ironically, eliminating the electoral college would decrease (rather than increase) the likelihood of all Americans to have their interests represented by the system. Why? Because politicians will go where the votes are. Why fight for the center that doesn't know what it wants when you can drive up turnout among your base with more and more radical platforms that reflect solely what the base wants?
The Republicans will have an incentive to be more right-wing, as they can get more out of seeing 90% vote totals across the south than they'd get shooting for 50.1% vote totals in more centrist states.
The Democrats will have an incentive to be more left-wing, as they can get more out of seeing 90% vote totals in our states than we'd get shooting for 50.1% vote totals in more centrist states.
Eventually, one of those two views wins the election, does it not? Would that lead to a more polarized and volatile political system, or a less volatile one? I argue with would lead to a more polarized and more volatile political system. You think gridlock is bad now? Just wait until you can't get a single bill through Congress because half of the country thinks "the goddamn rednecks" want to destroy America, and the other half thinks the "fucking socialists and minorities and gays and atheists" want to destroy the country.
You'll recognize the second half of that equation better in its original German.
The electoral college pushes the candidates toward policies that can build some kind of consensus. It moderates extremism and demands change happen over time. Is it frustrating that this means that legal progress lags behind philosophical progress? Yes, and that sucks for our side. But the EC forces all 50 ideas of government, all 50 sets of needs, all 50 forms of conservatism and socialism and liberalism and libertarianism and everything inbetween, it forces those running for office to consider and fight for those various and differing needs, wants, and desires.
Eliminate the EC and you may as well tell anyone in the center to pick between Jerry Falwell and Michael Moore. Don't even try to get out of that mess by suggesting a third party would arise. The two parties wouldn't allow it for precisely the reason they'd ignore more and more of the center -- because it isn't in their self-interest to allow another party to emerge.
Never mind the impossibility of a far left, far right, and centrist group of parties to coalesce into an actual government that actually gets anything done. We can't manage to do much with the two parties now. Imagine making each more radical and then adding a third party. Gridlock of today would seem like sweet, sweet Nirvana.
Keeping the Electoral College also means that legal regression lags behind philosophical regression. It is much harder for extreme policies to slip by the center and appeal directly -- and only -- to a large section of either pole. It keeps the ship of America between the buoys, as it were, until the whole of the ship is ready for a change in course. Small corrections occur, and massive turns that might otherwise flip the ship are avoided absent a crisis.
Lastly, and I think people should really consider this, is the idea that we should pursue this change because it will help us bring light to issues that affect city dwellers rather than other constituencies. Folks, people ignore poverty and inner city life because of cultural issues (selfishness, ignorance, apathy, bootstrap logic, etc), not because of the Electoral College. Candidates ran and did quite well running on anti-poverty platforms, on Civil Rights platforms, on left-wing platforms. FDR got elected so often they had to amend the Constitution!
Eliminating the Electoral College doesn't mean the nation would suddenly be filled with compassionate, rational, thoughtful people who can set aside personal ideology to do what's in the best interests of the nation.
We are, after all, governed by boomers -- perhaps the most self-centered group of people (as a whole -- relax friendly boomers) in the history of the country. Never has one cohort been so responsible for so much misery and never has one group been so selfish and single-minded in an "I gots to get mine and screw anyone else" sense.
There is no system of elections that undoes the special mix of ignorant Christianity and selfish boomerism that stains our politics. And even if there were, it would not be worth the trade off in stability and national cohesiveness to eliminate the Electoral College in pursuit of such a goal.