Electoral College is very necessary

Editor:
Your unsigned article ( Electoral College: Outdated or necessary evil?, March 20, 2008) on the Electoral College considered only two possibilities: Either it is outdated or it is an evil.


Is that bias or is it BIAS? If, as your Farm and Dairy article seems to imply, the Electoral College should be abolished, the Senate also should be abolished since there are only two senators from each state. Is that also outdated or evil?


Your article claimed the founding fathers created the Electoral College because they were skeptical that democracy would work and they wanted to limit the influence of voters.

Actually, the founding fathers carefully crafted the Constitution to protect the rights of minorities from the overwhelming power of the majorities.


Thus the Constitution included representation by population in the House, but built in a safeguard in the Senate. There are only 2 senators from each state, whether a small population state, like the more rural farm states, or a large population state, like those with big cities.


The number of each state’s members of the Electoral College is equal to the number of its members in the U.S. House and Senate. Thus, the United States legislative bodies and the Electoral College reflect not only each state’s population density, but also its status as part of the federal system.


If you would again publish your huge map of the states and their Electoral College votes, but this time as if only population counted, then your readers would see that Montana, Wyoming, North and South Dakota, Delaware, Vermont, and Alaska would have only one vote. Idaho, New Hampshire Hawaii, Rhode Island, Maine would have only two.


Do you think that candidates would spend any money and time in these “inconsequential” states? No!


All campaigning would be done in the high population centers, pandering to urban desires and ignoring concerns of the rural and smaller states.

In fact, the founding fathers were very wise to devise the Electoral College. It encourages campaigning in both large and smaller population centers. It requires candidates to appeal to a wide variety of needs.


It has worked well and will work well.
Barbara Hoshiko
Ashland, Ohio