Why did the FoundingFathers create theElectoral College? In

order to answer this question, it isimportant to go back in time andlook at the problems they were trying to solve more than two centuries ago.

The United States was a very different nation in the post–Revolutionary War years. There were only thirteen states, which var-ied in size. All the states were jealousand suspicious of one another’s

rights and powers and distrustful ofany central government telling themwhat to do.

The population of this mostlyrural country was only four millionin the 1780s. Citizens were spreadout, up and down about one thou-sand miles along the Atlantic Coast.Nationwide campaigns were imprac-tical, as people barely were con-nected in terms of transportationand communication.

At that time, most Americansbelieved that political parties wereevil and not to be trusted. The pop-

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The Founding

Fathers (also

called Framers of

the Constitution)

were members of

the convention

that drafted the

U.S. Constitution

in 1787.

ORIGINS OF THE

ELECTORAL COLLEGE

ORIGINS OF THE

ELECTORAL COLLEGEby William C. Kimberling

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ular saying of the day,“The office should seekthe man, the manshould not seek theoffice,” also showedtheir displeasure withgentlemen openly campaigning.

When they con-vened to draft the U.S.Constitution in 1787,the Founding Fathersgrappled with how tochoose a presidentwithout usingnational campaigns

and without the backing of political parties. They also did not want to upset their carefullydesigned balances between a futurepresident and Congress, between thestates and the federal government,and between the large and smallstates. The Framers at the Constitu-tional Convention considered sev-eral possible methods of selecting a president.

One idea, which eventually wasrejected, was to have Congresschoose the president. Some Found-ing Fathers felt that doing so wouldcreate division and hard feelings inCongress. Others believed that sucha procedure would invite inappro-priate political bargaining, corrup-

tion, and possibly even interferencefrom foreign powers. Still others feltthat this arrangement would upsetthe balance of power between thelegislative and executive branches of the federal government.

A second proposal was to havethe state legislatures select the presi-dent. This suggestion also was notsuccessful, as the Fathers feared that

This woodcut captures the official counting byCongress of the electoralvote in 1876, a traditionthat continues today.

Henry Clay (framed in background) was a man after theFounding Fathers’ hearts: He sacrificed his own politicalcareer to keep the country united in the years prior to the Civil War. Politician Mark Hanna (left), however, isportrayed as the kind of man the Founders feared. To him,the presidency and politics represented fame, money, andpower. In this editorial cartoon, Hanna claims, “It is betterto be president than to be right!”

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Beholden means

owing something

to another.

A federation is a

joining together

of states into a

league or federal

union.

A favorite son is

a man favored as

a presidential

candidate by his

own state.

America’s Founding Fathers basedaspects of our government on theancient Roman concept of a senateand rule by representation.

a president would become so beholdento the state legislatures that federalauthority would be weakened. Thiswould undermine the point of havinga federation.

A third failed idea was to have the president elected by a direct popular vote. The Framers of theConstitution feared that voters, lack-ing adequate information about can-didates from outside their own state,naturally would vote for a favoriteson from their own state or region(which still tends to happen today).At worst, no president would emergewith a popular majority sufficient to govern the country. At best, thechoice of president always would bedecided by the largest, most populousstates, and the smaller states wouldhave little influence.

Finally, a Committee of Eleven atthe Constitutional Convention pro-posed an indirect election of the

president through a College of Elec-tors. The original idea was for themost knowledgeable and informedindividuals from each state to com-municate with one another and sharetheir opinions. Then they wouldselect a president based solely on hismerit and without regard to his stateof origin or political party. Each statewould be given a number of presi-dential electors equal to its numberof U.S. senators (always two regard-less of the size of the state) plus itsnumber of U.S. representatives(which is based on the number ofresidents). Thus, the smaller stateswould have a slightly larger voice inchoosing the president than theywould through a direct popular election.

The individual presidential electorsthemselves would be chosen by eachstate in whatever way the statedecided. Until 1860, some states

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decided to let their legislatures choosetheir presidential electors: In thosestates, there were no popular electionsfor president at all!

The Founding Fathers based thestructure of the Electoral College onthe Centurial Assembly system of theancient Roman Republic. Under thatmethod, the adult male citizens ofRome were divided, according to theirwealth, into groups of one hundred,called centuries. Each century wasentitled to cast only one vote either infavor of or against proposals submit-ted to them by the Roman Senate. Inthe Electoral College, the states can becompared to the Centurial groups,with the states relying on geographyrather than wealth.

The resemblances between theElectoral College and classical institu-tions such as the Assembly are notaccidental. Many of the Founding

Fathers were schooled in ancient his-tory and understood its influences.

The Electoral College was designedby the Framers of the Constitution tosolve a number of problems Americafaced more than two hundred yearsago. And even with all the changes theUnited States has encountered (bettertransportation and communication,along with the rise of political partiesand national campaigns, for exam-ple), the Electoral College continuesto serve its purpose. The balancesbetween the legislative and executivebranches, between the state and fed-eral governments, and between thelarge and small states are addressed bythe College. And it continues to faceand solve new problems as they ariseover time. yWilliam C. Kimberling served as deputy director of the Federal Election Commission’s Office of ElectionAdministration. He has voted in every federal, state, and local election since 1964.

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The mostly well-to-do, educated Framers of the Constitution hoped theElectoral College would address their fears about the voting process.

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