...The Electoral College and the Popular vote have been a part of U.S. history since the founding of our country itself even though the actually process of both systems have changed since the late 1700’s and early 1800’s when they were first implemented. The debate on these two-unique systems have been brought to light due to the recent 2016 Presidential Election between the Presidential Candidates, Senator Hilary Clinton(D) and Donald Trump(R), when Donald Trump(R) won the 2016 Presidential Election by winning the Electoral College vote, even though he lost the popular vote. The purpose of this essay is to explain both voting systems and explain both in the best and most detail possible, as well as my personal opinion on the two, and if the current...
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...past 20 years, by the popular vote. Additionally, if you are a Republican in Maryland, because Maryland is predominantly a Democratic state, your vote would not matter in the majority of elections. Be it resolved that the United States presidential election be decided by the electoral college. (Pause…) We support this resolution on these four contentions. First, rural areas are constantly ignored by the electoral college and secondly, the electoral college fails to represent the national will. Also, the distribution of the electoral college votes per state is not equally dispersed. (Pause…) Lastly, the electoral college depresses the voter turnout. Be it. Resolved that the general population determines who wins the national election, not the electoral college. (Pause…)...
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...citizens to vote for the next person who they want to run the United States. There are two ways in which United States citizens can vote for a president, either by popular vote, or electoral college vote. The next president of the United States is the candidate who “...wins 270 electoral college votes…”, but most people believe that the next president should be the candidate who wins the popular vote. Presidential elections like the 1824, 1876, 1888, 2000, and 2016 elections shows that candidates are able to become president if they win enough electoral college vote, but they don’t win the popular vote. The current Electoral College vote doesn’t show the true feelings of United...
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...Electoral College is it really the best option? Most People would argue that the Electoral College is a good thing and that it “saves us from ourselves” but what good has it really done ? Sure , it's nice to think that if our nation were to try and elect someone totally unqualified for the office that the Electoral College would step in and fix our mistake but when has that ever been the case. The only examples i can give of the Electoral College doing anything is them electing people that the popular vote goes against. The most recent example is the Trump vs Clinton election. Hillary should have won the election based off of popular vote but she didn’t. Somehow trump won the presidency. Now i’m not complaining I wanted trump to win but...
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...The Electoral College was created for the purpose of making the little guys seem important, therefore making the number of Electoral College votes per state unequally dispersed. If the amount of Electoral College votes a state received was based on population, smaller states would not be relevant. While this dispersion method made our small states happy, it produced many a consequences and made the value of each person’s vote different. Each individual vote in California counts for about five times as much in the Electoral College as each individual vote in Maine. For instance, California has fifty-five electoral votes for a population of about 38.8 million people and maine has four electoral votes for a population of almost 1.33 million. California...
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...called the Electoral College. The process of the electoral college is complex and has many components to how it works. The only power the people have over the electoral college is the ability to appoint our electors through the popular vote; however, the electors have free reign, without needing consent from the people, over who is in charge every four years. Within the Electoral College is a rich history, pros and cons, how electors are chosen, how the difference of the popular vote cause Serbian states to be swing states, and why past elections have brought up questions about if the electoral college should be amended. The original philosophy behind the electoral college is what has caused the rich history of the electoral college. Everything began in 1789 when the idea of the electoral college came to elect our very first president. The Electoral College is a system of selecting the next president by electors who vote based on the popular vote of America (U.S. Electoral College). Alexander Hamilton created the original form of the...
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...difficulty passing bills Primary reason: president is an integral part of the legislative process Appoint federal justices and government employees (e.g. heads of CIA and Federal Reserve) Enforce laws executive orders Order of the president without Congressional approval that has the force of law Only operates within the framework of an existing piece of legislation or constitutional power Order based on a certain interpretation Example: Harry Truman integrates the armed forces Ends segregation of blacks and whites in the army Issue pardons Electoral college There are two electoral colleges Electoral college & the House Same thing in Britain Candidates compete to win individual states (national popular vote not important) Each state is worth a certain number of voters (bigger states are worth more) Race to 270 votes – a candidate must win a majority of electoral votes – 270 is the magic number out of 538 total votes – if...
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...argument, dissonance, lack of harmony, heated conflict Controversy- Denotation v. connotation Denotation = meaning The most direct, exact, specific meaning of a work or expression Literal meaning- meaning without interpretation, embellishment, or exaggeration A dictionary definition. Subjective and “cold” Connotation = suggestion Emotional coloration Suggested or implied meaning in addition to what is explicit, objected, denoted Impression that goes beyond a defined meaning Emotional association with a word, phrase, idea Subjective and emotively “loaded” September 17 Democracy- people, common people. People’s rule. Types of democracy Direct- when all members of a community (polity, group) gather together and individuals cast a vote or make decisions=each person is given a chance to influence the policymaking process Representative- when one person or a group of people are elected and assigned with the task of making decisions on behalf of the group of citizens (“constituency”) that they represent Voters- demos – choose (elect) representatives for a public office through the act of voting Voting = a formal expression of preference for a candidate that is made known through a marked ballot We assume that we as...
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...superior over the other two. The three branches that are based on the principle of separated institutions sharing power are the legislative, executive and judicial. Each branch has powers that it can use to check and balance the operations and power of the other two branches (Kelly, 2013, para. 1). What makes this system effective is that each branch must be willing to compromise to ensure the American people needs are put first and the safety and security of the nation is constantly being enforced. For instance in an attempt to limit the power that each branch could have over the other two, Congress which is divided into two houses provides a check on each other. The President can reject legislation, but he can be overruled by a two-thirds popular vote in both houses. The judiciary can lay out laws considered undemocratic (Powell, 1996). Therefore it becomes crucial that all parties involved learn to work together and put their difference aside...
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...With any U.S. president there are going to be achievements and also controversies. The last two presidents the United States have elected into office have had to deal with major national crisis as well of the other burdens and responsibilities of being president. Each president has had very defining events and decisions of their presidency that they will be remembered for and that have made lasting changes for the United States. In 2001 George W. Bush became one of the few U.S presidents to win the Electoral College vote, but lose the National popular vote. He lost the National popular vote by more then half a million voters. Most people believe if you win the National popular vote you win Electoral College vote, and in most cases that does happen but for the first since Benjamin Harris’ presidency Bush won with 271 electoral votes. He needed 270 to win. In his first State of the Union address in 2001, he vowed to end racial profiling. In 2003 although not completely affective or airtight he issued an order to about seventy law enforcement agencies calling for an end to racial and ethnic profiling. This was the first ban of its kind. One of Bushes first policy decisions was on the matter of abortion. He decided to reinstate the ban on aid to international groups performing or counseling on abortion. Former President Ronald Reagan originally initiated the ban, which was a controversial political matter that was in and out of affect for over 25 years. The ban was rescinded during...
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...In Federalist paper number 10 James Madison explains why there should be a concern over majority and minority factions and solutions to lessen the dangers of these factions. When our goverment first started it was made originally to help and be closely tied to the citizens of the United States. Some aspects of this has changed since the beginning of the constitution resulting in some majority and minority rule change. When the Consititution was first written it was made to simply limit majority rule and give eqaul amount of power to the minority. The national goverment was originally built closely tied to citizens because of the House of Repesentatives. The House of Representatives was made to give citizens an equal say in the legislation of the United States. Unlike in the Senate, members of the House are elected by the people of the United States giving citizens a say in govenment affairs. One of the major aspects of the national goverment that is tied to citizens is the short term lenght and frequency of elections of people holding an office in the goverment. With the short term lenght and frequency of elections citizens are constantly contributing to what is going on in the nation by voting on who will be the best candidate for a certain office. A third reason the national goverment is closely tied to citizens is that the House of Representatives represents small member districts. This causes there to be close to equal say for everyone in a state to elect someone to represent...
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...History of David Brearley David Brearley was born June 11, 1745 in Spring Grove, New Jersey. He was 1 of 5 children born to an unwealthy family. His father David Brearley, Sr. was a landowner. He attended Princeton College of New Jersey but did not graduate. He chose law as his career and practiced in Allentown, New Jersey where he took on Public Security and Interests Law as his profession. He married Elizabeth Mullen in 1767 who died in 1777 and remarried to Elizabeth Higbee in 1783. He was the father of 4 children. He was backed by the Revolutionary cause and was arrested by the British for High Treason, but the Patriots freed him by an angry mob who stormed the prison. In 1776 David Brearley became part of the Constitutional Convention...
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...presides over the Senate? Vice President Powers of the Speaker of the House- Call on people to speak, assign bills to committees, set time limits for debates. Nancy Pelosi- Speaker of the House, from San Francisco, California. Pro tempore- has to do with the fact that the vice president never shows up to the senate, the senior member of the major party is the leader of the senate Majority leader- the person who sets the agenda for the party Whip- the one who counts the votes and makes sure it gets done…twists peoples arms to get them to vote their way. Filibuster- somebody talks as long as they want Cloture- two thirds majority vote in the senate, you can limit the amount of time spent debating a bill. Riders- attached to bills and usually have nothing to do with bills, attempt to get politicians to vote on the bill. Amendments to bills- if a bill is sent back from the senate to the house then it would be amended. Has to go through both houses in identical form Electoral college- the way we elect our president…each state gets an...
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...COMPARATIVE FOREING GOVERNMENT The US Political system- principles, institutions, rules and performance * A Democratic Republic * Political power, authority and legitimacy resides in the ¨we the people¨ * Officeholders serve specified terms and face regularly schedule elections * Political office cannot be inherited or conferred (no monarch, no nobility) * A constitutional system * A single document defining government powers, institutions and their functions, electoral procedures * Short and difficult to amend * Flexible and adaptable to changing circumstances (¨living document¨) * Widely perceived as legitimate by ¨we the people¨ * A representative democracy * Elected representatives –not ¨we the people¨-- make national law and policy (no referenda, recall, or ballot initiative) * The rule of law * Power of government over citizens explicitly limited (bill of rights) * The judiciary (federal courts) is on independent brunch of government whose members are protected by interference * All the elected are subjected to the law * Appointed officials are accountable to elected officials and to the courts * Institutional characteristics * /Separation of power/ divides political power and governmental authority among three branches having distinctive powers * Checks and balances allows each branch to offset the powers of the others * A powerful bicameral legislature with a meaningful upper house *...
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...On November 6th 2012 American could have a new president; this two horse race is between Republican Mitt Romney and Democratic Barack Obama. This report will be looking to assess if Mitt Romney could become the next President. Such factors come into consideration as who Romney is? What’s is his plan to win over the American voters, What polices he will be focusing on and how popular they are with voters, tracking the polls to see where he stands, analysing his campaign to see if it has had any major triumphs or disasters, is Romney on the right path to get 270 electrical votes and most importantly looking at his opponent Barack Obama and is he likely to win again?. Using sources such as newspapers, online journals and poll websites to evaluate how successful Romney’s campaign will be. Romney The man, the plan. Mitt Romney has emerged through the rankings of the Republican Party to run in the 2012 Presidential campaign. Romney attended Harvard University where he studied law and business. He later moved on to become a high powered business executive who swiftly stepped into his father’s former position as Governor of Massachusetts in 2002. Even though he only served one term he quickly had his sights set higher but he was unsuccessful in his first attempt at becoming a Presidential candidate when he lost out to John McCain in 2008. Successful the second time around, he is committed to making sure someone in the race “understands” the Economy. During the race for the 2012...
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