YOU ARE enjoying a lazy afternoon watching television when you start to feel kind of hot. Even though it is mid November, you chalk it up to El Nino and return your attention to "The Real World" marathon. Suddenly, the fire alarm begins to beep. You sigh, figuring it is a drill, and remove your gaze from the television. Flames are descending quickly down the stairs. You set off on a mad dash for the door, but then remember your security blanket is upstairs. You stop, panicked. You have two options: abandon the blanket or face the fiery inferno.
Hopefully, you would decide to run for the door.
Circumstances change, and sometimes we need to let go of things that were once valuable. Holding onto things because they have always been there or were at one time useful paralyzes us from making necessary decisions and moving into the future.
The Electoral College is one of these things. If we do not let it go, we are going to watch our democracy burn in hypocrisy. A democracy is based on the principle of "one man, one vote." The Electoral Colleges destroys this principle. Because each state has a number of Electoral College votes equal to its number of Senators plus Representatives, this places more weight on the votes of citizens who live in smaller states.
It is ridiculous to argue that a citizen's opinion is more valuable than another citizen's opinion solely because he lives in a state with a small population. Whether we live in Rhode Island, Texas or California, we are all American citizens. We are electing the American president. We all are accountable for our nation, and for our president. If American citizens equally shoulder the responsibility of the government, we must equally shoulder the choice.
Every American citizen should have an equal weight in deciding the next president. The national government, and the president, is the representative of the people, not the representative of the state governments.
A state does not have one interest. At best, the majority of citizens in one state have a common interest. The Electoral College, by focusing on the interests of the states, marginalizes voters who disagree with the majority of citizens in their state. Citizens who support the minority interest in a state should not be silenced in the name of states' rights.
For example, in Virginia, citizens who voted for the Democratic candidate were never heard. They might as well have stayed home. All the electoral votes from Virginia went to George W. Bush, so any Virginia citizen who voted otherwise had absolutely no effect on the election. Virginia, and every other state, is comprised of citizens with many different values and many different desires for our government. Not all Virginians support the Republican platform. The Electoral College ignores this fact, and thus not only allows the majority to rule, but also prevents the minority from having a voice.
Two hundred citizens in Florida should not have a larger impact on the election than 200,000 citizens hailing from other states. This election, regardless of the outcome, should reveal the Electoral College for the anachronism that it is. When the Framers wrote the Constitution, the system of electing the president that evolved into the Electoral College may have been a necessary institution. The Framers were testing the unknown waters of a representative republic, and they were afraid of the consequences of a government too democratic. Many of them feared the effects that could result from giving power to the common man.
History, however, has brushed this concern aside. The common man has proven to be capable of self-governance. Citizens do not need to be guided by some knowledgeable elite.
Instituting the direct popular election of the president is the only way that each and every citizen's opinion will count, and every man will be allowed to exercise his natural right of self-governance.
Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Illinois), has introduced legislation to institute popular election of the president. Hillary Clinton has promised to co-author such an amendment in the Senate.
It is imperative that representatives know that their constituents support and demand a direct popular election. The last attempt to amend the system, in 1969, while being supported in the House and by President Nixon, was thwarted by senators from small states. The equality of citizens' votes, however, should be more important than the selfish greed of smaller states, which already have disproportionate representation in Congress.
That is why it is so important to write, call and generally harass your representatives. Make it clear that the common man is ready to shoulder the responsibility of directly electing the American president.
(Kelly Sarabyn is a Cavalier Daily columnist.)
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