Dear Mr. Senator,

I believe that the way our elections are run are not what is best for the United States. The Electoral College is changing the way that we originally set out to vote and is making things unfair for the citizens who vote. I propose that the Electoral College is taken away all together in order for elections to be more fair, and more like the original intention of the U.S. With most states following the winner takes all idea, the winner of the general public may not be the candidate that wins the elections. These times are rare, but they happened before there is nothing that is stopping them from happening again.

A lot of voters who are not very well educated may not even understand what the electoral college is or what they are actually voting for when they vote. Instead of voting for the candidate that they want as the next president, they are voting for a group of electors that decide who will win. Sometimes, the electors that are assigned to that candiadate will not vote for them. This process also seems to disriciminate against the less populated states because they don't have as much a say in the college and are often forgoten in the rush of propaganda and aren't really aware of who they should pick and why they should pick them. In The Indefensible Electoral College: Why even the best-laid defenses of the system are wrong by Bradfor Plumer, Plumer explains that one of the best arguments against the Electoral College is that the rate of disaster is so high. In 2000, there was a elctoral crisis based upoun the Electoral College, because Al Gore recieved more individual votes, but George W. Bush still won the election.

Another reason that this process is so unstable is the way that it makes voters feel about voting. In large states, where this a majority of either republican or democrats, voters may think that if they are in the minority, and the other party will surely win the election, what's the point of voting. If there was no Electoral College, the votes that they put in could contribute to the greater pool of that parties voters, while with Electoral College the votes are pointless and basically disapear. That, to me, is robbing the citizens of the U.S. of thir right to vote. According to Richard A. Posner, the Electoral College restores some of the weight that the large states hold in a presidental election. However, the large states may not have all of one party and those other votes can really make a difference.

Some argue that a few votes can not do a lot and that the Electoral College is a far more organized way to conduct the voting. But every vote counts, and if every voter understood why they were voting for who they were voting for then the president may be a majority favorite. It seems unfair that the president of the United States, the most important man in the country, is not truely picked by the voters, but by the Elctoral College. The Office of the Federal Register says that the electors that are selected are chosen by the candidates political party but that stae laws differ on how they are specifically selected. This way does not seem like the best way of performing the task and I can see how it results in issues. Trusting the weight of the United Stated on the the backs iof only 538 electors is not the most stable way to perform an election. Why trust a select group with this descion if the whole United States can contribute to it?

I think that it is criticall that we change the idea of an Electoral College to the idea that all of the people in the United States are able to contribute equally to who should be the next president based on what they believe is right. Bradford Plummer believes that one of the most worrying thoughts is that there will be a tie with the electors. If that were to occur the elction would fall into the hands of the House of Representitives, resulting in all the states, no matter what their population is, having the same amount of votes, casuing a president that may be very far away than what the majority of the United States actually wants. This may seem unlikely but in fact there have already been many close calls. In 1968, only 41,971 votes would have deadlockes the election. In 1976 a tie would have happened if 5,559 voters in Hawaii, and 3,687 voters in Hawaii had voted the other way (The Indefensibel Electoral College: Why even the best-laid defenses of the system are wrong, by Bradofrd Plummer.) A tie may occur and if it does, A lot of citizens would be very upset that the president did not win by popularity, but by the Electoral College.

There are many reasons that the Elctoral College is unfair to the voters of the U.S. State inequality, diaster, ties, and people loosing the urge to vote. The list goes on and on and if this doesn't make you see what is wrong with this system than I don't know what will. I hope you take this information to good use and use it to tear down this unfair system once and for all. If we really want to be a democracy, than we have to do away with this system. Many of Americans believe that this is the best way and several have published interesting papers on that topic that may chaneg the minds of people who are still for it. I hope this dream to get rid of the unfair and terrible system that is the Electoral College is accomplished soon.

Sincerely,

A Concerned Citizen