Essay: Opinion on the Electoral College

Since becoming officially ratified 1804 the electoral college has been a key part in the success of the American political system. The idea of an electoral college came up at the Constitutional Convention of 1787, when thinking of all the possible routes of electing a president. The two main reasons for creating it was so that there was a buffer in between the population and the selection of the Presidents and to give power to smaller states. Since then, the electoral college has evolved with the nation. The electoral college should remain in place because it still satisfies the job of protecting smaller areas of the nation, maintaining representation, and protecting smaller states/ rural areas.
First, the electoral college ensures that all parts of the nation, rural or urban, are representative and involved in the election. It allows states with smaller population needs and wants to be heard and accounted for. If the election was just based on popular vote, then candidates would only visit states with large populations such as California, Texas, Florida, and New York. Candidates would not campaign in states with smaller areas and would not consider what they want. The electoral college forces candidates to visit and listen to smaller states. Without them doing this the candidate would never win because they need as many states as they can. Candidates have to address policies in their platform that addresses large states and smaller states.
Secondly, the electoral college guarantees certainty to the outcome of the Presidential election. If the election was solely based on the popular vote, there would be a possibility of a candidate receiving the most votes, but the number of votes is not a majority. This has happened with the popular vote before, but not many times. In all of the years that the electoral college has been put in place, a candidate losing the popular vote but winning the electoral has only happened five times and therefore won the election (John Quincy Adams over Andrew Jackson, Rutherford B. Hayes over Samuel Tilden, Benjamin Harrison over Grover Cleveland, George W. Bush over Al Gore, and Trump over Hillary). The amount of times that the electoral college vote and popular vote have lined up together can help further show that the electoral college is properly functioning.
Lastly, the electoral college maintains representation within the government. The founding forefathers were weary of having just the popular vote. They believed that a tyrant may come into play and manipulate public opinion. The tyrant could lead them to believe in something that is not best for the population as a whole or is not accurate. They believed that educated electors should be the main input into who becomes President. By having electors vote it can help eliminate manipulation within voting as well as ensuring that someone “qualified” becomes President.
People who disagree with the electoral college may argue that it can make one’s vote feel that is doesn’t matter due to the fact that a candidate may win the popular vote and lose the electoral and thus not becoming President. Changes to the electoral college are most likely not going to happen any time soon. In order to change it, ratification from ¾ of the states is needed. This would be extremely hard to get past the smaller states.
The electoral college has been functioning well for the last 200 years and has proficiently stopped the problems it intended to block, such as smaller areas being ignored, lack of representation in the government, and uncertain outcomes in the Presidential election.