Today, the US Electoral College will meet in 51 separate locations to decide who will become the next President of the United States. The decision these individual men and women make will determine the outcome of every significant global event for the next decade, if not the next century.
Earlier this year, on 4th August, the Harvard Republican Club issued a press release stating that, for the first time in their one hundred and twenty-eight year history, they would not be endorsing the Republican nominee for president. The presumptive nominee, they said, was not just unfit to be president but represented, “a threat to the survival of the republic”.
They went on to say that, “His authoritarian tendencies and flirtations with fascism are unparalleled in the history of our democracy.” and that, “He hopes to divide us by race, by class, and by religion, instilling enough fear and anxiety to propel himself to the White House”. This approach, with a little assistance from foreign hackers, has brought him within touching distance of the White House.
Less than five months later, 306 Republican members of the electoral college must now decide whether to elect that same man president. A man who their fellow Republicans say “is looking to pit neighbor against neighbor, friend against friend, American against American.”
In the Federalist paper describing the system for electing the president, Alexander Hamilton warned that foreign powers might try to raise ” a creature of their own” to the presidency. There would be, he argued, no better way for a foreign power to destroy America than to “gain an improper ascendant in our councils”.
The framers of the US constitution chose to place the trust of electing a president with an intermediate body of electors, the electoral college, rather than directly with the people, specifically to protect against such an improper person becoming president. Later today, we will find out whether their idea worked.
Some electors are bound by state laws to vote for the party’s nominee. But around 27 states do not require electors to vote for the nominees of their parties. If just 37 Republicans from those states choose not to vote for their party’s nominee, then the most unfit candidate in history will be prevented from ascending to the most powerful office in the world.
One Texan Republican has already indicated he will not vote to elect Trump. If 36 more Republican electors join in “condemning and withholding their endorsement from this dangerous man” then they have the power to change the course of history for the better.
* Scott Craig is a member of the Liberal Democrats, currently living in Edinburgh
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13 Comments
but they won’t of course. That would be revolutionary.
Before the election the Democrats were very outraged that Trump suggested that the election was rigged, and that he might not concede defeat on election night. Now they turn around and pull this hairbrained scheme.
It’s funny to see Democrats and US Liberals suddenly becoming constitutional orignalists.
Even if they somehow managed to gather the needed electors, it would be kicked down to the house of representatives, and guess what, they would vote for Trump.
This is mind numbingly stupid.
I think it likely that Trump will be a one term president, his unfavourables are very high and it should not be that hard to the Democrats to come up with someone better (they don’t even need to find someone good, bust sufficiently better). He is likely to do a lot of damage but It is hard to see him lasting more than the one term.
To me the ‘Electoral College’ is out of date and not Democratic. I always thought that one man one vote was, resulting in the Democrats winning Both the UK system and the US systems no longer fit the modern world.
@nigel hunter
The point of the Electoral College was, and is, to protect the small states interests from being ignored by the large states. Even the original 13 states had a wide range of populations, with states like New York and Pennsylvania being far larger than Delaware and Rhode Island. Both Democratic and Republican candidates knew the electoral system; if Hillary Clinton had not gone into the election thinking that she was going to win by a landslide, she might have spent a little more time in those states that Obama won but she lost.
Just to be clear, no elector can be bound, at the election, by state laws because that would be in violation of the Constitution: see (Art2[1]) and Amendment 12. Both Hamilton and Madison were clear that electors were free to come to their own decisions. Some States have attempted to hold person to their prior pledge by law. It is not clear if this is unconstitutional or not. Texas does not have a prior pledge law so the Texas elector can change his pledge. There are attempts afoot to try to bind electors to the national popular vote. It is difficult to see how they can succeed.
I loathe Donald Trump and have deep fears about what he will do, but this is a foolish and illiberal idea. If the Electoral College ended up deadlocked, the House of Representatives would decide the election. If Hillary Clinton won because Trump electors had flipped over, it would tear the US apart.
Hi Plain speaker.
The US Supreme Court has not, so far as I can find, ruled on whether state laws binding electors are constitutional. I share your view that such laws are likely to be unconstitutional.
Good Afternoon Scott
You are correct – there has not yet been a formal challenge in the Supreme Court. I suspect that most legal experts think that states cannot bind electors. As far as I am aware, the electroral college votes are not secret and over the years there have been many faithless electors. None has been prosecuted (nor sued for breaking a pledge).
One would-be “faithless” elector in Minnesota who attempted to cast a vote for Sanders instead of Clinton has been replaced, in accordance with state law.
@Alan
The squence of events is not clear but I think this elector was disqualified under prior pledge law before he cast his vote. This type of law has existed since the 50s. The other issue is whether, having already cast a ‘faithless’ vote, an elector can have that vote disqualified by state law, or alternatively face a penalty for being ‘faithless’. As far as I am aware, no state has tried to take that step. Incidentally, the present campaign to have electors represent the popular vote, requires electors to be ‘faithless’.
And if the Electoral College does not confirm Trump? Do we get Pence? Or do they nominate a.n.other, who would have a very questionable mandate? What a mess, when the world is in turmoil anyway…..
Paul King
Well, the results are in and show just how much the MSM has lost touch with reality and how wide of the mark it is nowadays.
Trump suffered two “faithless” elector defections. Hillary suffered four with another three attempted but unsuccessful defections.