United States Electoral College is the body that elects the president and vice p

resident of the United States every four years. Citizens of the United States do
not directly elect the president or the vice president; instead they choose "el
ectors", who pledge beforehand to vote for the candidate who wins in their party
.[2][3]
Each state gets to choose as many electors as the combined total of the number o
f U.S. senators and representatives to which the state is entitled.[4] The Distr
ict of Columbia gets at most the number of electors it would have if it were a s
tate but not more than the number of electors of the least-populous state (curre
ntly three).[5] There are therefore currently 538 electors, corresponding to the
435 representatives and 100 senators in theHouse of Representatives and the Sen
ate, plus the three electors for the District of Columbia. The Constitution bars
any federal official, elected or appointed, from being an elector.
All states except Maine and Nebraska have chosen electors on a "winner-take-all"
basis since the 1880s.[6] Under the winner-take-all system, all the electors th
at a state chooses are those that have pledged to vote for the candidate who end
s up getting the most votes in that state. Maine and Nebraska use the "congressi
onal district method", selecting one elector within each congressional district
by popular vote and selecting the remaining two electors by a statewide popular
vote.[7] Although no elector is required by federal law to honor their pledge, t
here have been very few occasions when an elector voted contrary to a pledge.[8]
[9] The Twelfth Amendment, in specifying how a president and vice president are
elected, requires each elector to cast one vote for president and another vote f
or vice president.[10][11]
The candidate who receives an absolute majority of electoral votes (currently 27
0) for the office of president or of vice president is elected to that office. T
he Twelfth Amendment provides for what happens if the Electoral College fails to
elect a president or vice president. If no candidate receives a majority for pr
esident then the House of Representatives will select the president, with each s
tate delegation (instead of each representative) having only one vote. If no can
didate receives a majority for vice president, then the Senate will select the v
ice president, with each senator having one vote.[12][13]
Background
The Constitutional Convention in 1787 used the Virginia Plan as the basis for di
scussions, as the Virginia delegation had proposed it first. The Virginia Plan c
alled for the Congress to elect the president.[14] Delegates from a majority of
states agreed to this mode of election.[15] However, a committee formed to work
out various details including the mode of election of the president, recommended
instead the election be by a group of people apportioned among the states in th
e same numbers as their representatives in Congress (the formula for which had b
een resolved in lengthy debates resulting in the Connecticut Compromise and Thre
e-Fifths Compromise), but chosen by each state "in such manner as its Legislatur
e may direct." Committee member Gouverneur Morris explained the reasons for the
change; among others, there were fears of "intrigue" if the president were chose
n by a small group of men who met together regularly, as well as concerns for th
e independence of the president if he was elected by the Congress.[16] Some dele
gates, including James Wilson and James Madison, preferred popular election of t
he executive. Madison acknowledged that while a popular vote would be ideal, it
would be difficult to get consensus on the proposal given the prevalence of slav
ery in the South:
There was one difficulty however of a serious nature attending an immediate choi
ce by the people. The right of suffrage was much more diffusive in the Northern
than the Southern States; and the latter could have no influence in the election
on the score of Negroes. The substitution of electors obviated this difficulty
and seemed on the whole to be liable to the fewest objections.[17]
The Convention approved the Committee's Electoral College proposal, with minor m
odifications, on September 6, 1787.[18] Delegates from the small states generall
y favored the Electoral College out of concern large states would otherwise cont
rol presidential elections.[19]
In The Federalist Papers, James Madison explained his views on the selection of

the president and the Constitution. In Federalist No. 39, Madison argued the Con
stitution was designed to be a mixture of state-based and population-based gover
nment. Congress would have two houses: the state-based Senate and the population
-based House of Representatives. Meanwhile, the president would be elected by a
mixture of the two modes.[20] Alexander Hamilton in Federalist No. 68 laid out t
he key advantages to the Electoral College. The electors come directly from the
people and them alone for that purpose only, and for that time only. This avoide
d a party-run legislature, or a permanent body that could be influenced by forei
gn interests before each election.[21]
Alexander Hamilton explained the election was to take place among all the states
, so no corruption in any state could taint "the great body of the people" in th
eir selection. The choice was to be made by a majority of the Electoral College,
as majority rule is critical to the principles of republican government. Hamilt
on argued, electors meeting in the state capitals were able to have information
unavailable to the general public. No one who is an elector can be a U.S. office
holder, so none of the electors would be immediately beholden to a given preside
ntial candidate.[21]
Another consideration was the decision would be made without "tumult and disorde
r", as it would be a broad-based one made simultaneously in various locales wher
e the decision-makers could deliberate reasonably, not in one place, where decis
ion-makers could be threatened or intimidated. If the Electoral College did not
achieve a decisive majority, then the House of Representatives was to choose the
president, and the Senate the vice president, selecting among the top five cand
idates, ensuring selection of a presiding officer administering the laws would h
ave both ability and good character.[21]
Additionally, in the Federalist No. 10, James Madison argued against "an interes
ted and overbearing majority" and the "mischiefs of faction" in an electoral sys
tem. He defined a faction as "a number of citizens whether amounting to a majori
ty or minority of the whole, who are united and actuated by some common impulse
of passion, or of interest, adverse to the rights of other citizens, or to the p
ermanent and aggregate interests of the community." What was then called republi
can government (i.e., federalism, as opposed to direct democracy), with its vari
ed distribution of voter rights and powers, would countervail against factions.
Madison further postulated in the Federalist No. 10 that the greater the populat
ion and expanse of the Republic, the more difficulty factions would face in orga
nizing due to such issues as sectionalism.[22]
Although the United States Constitution refers to "Electors" and "electors," nei
ther the phrase "Electoral College" nor any other name is used to describe the e
lectors collectively. It was not until the early 19th century the name "Electora
l College" came into general usage as the collective designation for the elector
s selected to cast votes for president and vice president. The phrase was first
written into federal law in 1845 and today the term appears in 3 U.S.C.4, in the secti
on heading and in the text as "college of electors."[23]
History
Original plan
Article II, Section 1, Clause 2 of the Constitution states:
Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct,
a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives
to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representa
tive, or Person holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United States, sh
all be appointed an Elector.
Article II, Section 1, Clause 4 of the Constitution states:
The Congress may determine the Time of chusing [sic] the Electors, and the Day o
n which they shall give their Votes; which Day shall be the same throughout the
United States.
Article II, Section 1, Clause 3 of the Constitution provided the original plan b
y which the electors chose the president and vice president. Under the original
plan, the candidate who received a majority of votes from the electors would bec
ome president; the candidate receiving the second most votes would become vice p
resident.

The original plan of the Electoral College was based upon several assumptions an
d anticipations of the Framers of the Constitution:[24]
1.
Individual electors would be elected by citizens on a district-b
y-district basis.[25]
2.
Each presidential elector would exercise independent judgment wh
en voting.
3.
Candidates would not pair together on the same ticket with assum
ed placements toward each office of president and vice president.
4.
The system as designed would rarely produce a winner, thus sendi
ng the election to Congress.
According to the text of Article II, however, each state government was free to
have its own plan for selecting its electors, and the Constitution does not expl
icitly require states to popularly elect their electors. Several different metho
ds for selecting electors are described at length below.
Breakdown and revision
The emergence of political parties and nationally coordinated election campaigns
soon complicated matters in the elections of 1796 and 1800. In 1796, Federalist
Party candidate John Adams won the presidential election. Finishing in second p
lace was Democratic-Republican Party candidate Thomas Jefferson, the Federalists
' opponent, who became the vice president. This resulted in the President and Vi
ce President not being of the same political party.
In 1800, the Democratic-Republican Party again nominated Jefferson for president
, and also nominated Aaron Burr for vice president. After the election, Jefferso
n and Burr both obtained a majority of electoral votes, but tied one another wit
h 73 votes each. Since ballots did not distinguish between votes for president a
nd votes for vice president, every ballot cast for Burr technically counted as a
vote for him to become president, despite Jefferson clearly being his party's f
irst choice. Lacking a clear winner by constitutional standards, the election ha
d to be decided by the House of Representatives pursuant to the Constitution's c
ontingency election provision.
Having already lost the presidential contest, Federalist Party representatives i
n the lame duck House session seized upon the opportunity to embarrass their opp
osition and attempted to elect Burr over Jefferson. The House deadlocked for 35
ballots as neither candidate received the necessary majority vote of the state d
elegations in the House (the votes of nine states were needed for an election).
Jefferson achieved electoral victory on the 36th ballot, but only after Federali
who disfavored Burr's personal character more t
st Party leader Alexander Hamilton
han Jefferson's policies had made known his preference for Jefferson.
Responding to the problems from those elections, the Congress proposed the Twelf
th Amendment in 1803 prescribing electors cast separate ballots for president and
vice president to replace the system outlined in Article II, Section 1, Clause 3.
By June 1804, the states had ratified the amendment in time for the 1804 electio
n.
Evolution to the general ticket
Alexander Hamilton described the framers' view of how electors would be chosen,
"A small number of persons, selected by their fellow-citizens from the general m
ass, will be most likely to possess the information and discernment requisite to
such complicated [tasks]."[26]The founders assumed this would take place distri
ct by district. That plan was carried out by many states until the 1880s. For ex
ample, in Massachusetts in 1820, the rule stated "the people shall vote by ballo
t, on which shall be designated who is voted for as an Elector for the district.
"[27] In other words, the people did not place the name of a candidate for a pre
sident on the ballot, instead they voted for their local elector, whom they trus
ted later to cast a responsible vote for president.
Some states reasoned that the favorite presidential candidate among the people i
n their state would have a much better chance if all of the electors selected by
their state were sure to vote the same way
a "general ticket" of electors pledged
to a party candidate.[28] So the slate of electors chosen by the state were no
longer free agents, independent thinkers, or deliberative representatives. They
became "voluntary party lackeys and intellectual non-entities."[29] Once one sta

te took that strategy, the others felt compelled to follow suit in order to comp
ete for the strongest influence on the election.[28]
When James Madison and Hamilton, two of the most important architects of the Ele
ctoral College, saw this strategy being taken by some states, they protested str
ongly. Madison and Hamilton both made it clear this approach violated the spirit
of the Constitution. According to Hamilton, the selection of the president shou
ld be "made by men most capable of analyzing the qualities adapted to the statio
n [of president]."[26] According to Hamilton, the electors were to analyze the l
ist of potential presidents and select the best one. He also used the term "deli
berate." Hamilton considered a pre-pledged elector to violate the spirit of Arti
cle II of the Constitution insofar as such electors could make no "analysis" or
"deliberate" concerning the candidates. Madison agreed entirely, saying that whe
n the Constitution was written, all of its authors assumed individual electors w
ould be elected in their districts and it was inconceivable a "general ticket" o
f electors dictated by a state would supplant the concept. Madison wrote to Geor
ge Hay,
The district mode was mostly, if not exclusively in view when the Constitution w
as framed and adopted; & was exchanged for the general ticket [many years later]
.[30]
The founders assumed that electors would be elected by the citizens of their dis
trict and that elector was to be free to analyze and deliberate regarding who is
best suited to be president.
Madison and Hamilton were so upset by what they saw as a distortion of the frame
original intent that they advocated for a constitutional amendment to prevent an
rs
ything other than the district plan: "the election of Presidential Electors by d
istricts, is an amendment very proper to be brought forward," Madison told Georg
e Hay in 1823.[30] Hamilton went further. He actually drafted an amendment to th
e Constitution mandating the district plan for selecting electors.[31]
Evolution of selection plans
In 1789, at-large popular vote, the winner-take-all method, began with PA and MD
; VA and DE used a district plan by popular vote, and in the five other states,
state legislatures chose. By 1800, VA and RI voted at-large, KY, MD and NC voted
popularly by district, and eleven states voted by state legislature. Beginning
in 1804, there was a definite trend towards the winner-take-all system for state
wide popular vote.[32]
States using their state legislature to choose presidential electors have includ
ed fourteen states from all regions of the country. By 1832, only SC used the st
ate legislature, and it abandoned the method after 1860.[33] States using popula
r vote by district have included ten states from all regions of the country. By
1832 there was only Maryland, and from 1836 district plans fell out of use until
the 20th century, though Michigan used a district plan for 1892 only.[34]
Since 1836, the statewide, winner-take-all popular vote for electors has been th
e almost universal practice. Currently ME from 1972 and Nebraska from 1996 use t
he district plan, with two at-large electors going for the statewide popular vot
e winner.[35]
Fourteenth Amendment
Section 2 of the Fourteenth Amendment allows for a state's representation in the
House of Representatives to be reduced if a state unconstitutionally denies peo
ple the right to vote. The reduction is in keeping with the proportion of people
denied a vote. This amendment refers to voting "at any election for the choice
of electors for President and Vice President of the United States;" the only pla
ce in the Constitution mentioning electors being selected by popular vote.
On May 8, 1866, during a debate on the Fourteenth Amendment, Thaddeus Stevens, t
he leader of the Republicans in the House of Representatives, delivered a speech
on the amendment's intent. Regarding Section 2, he said:[36]
The second section I consider the most important in the article. It fixes the ba
sis of representation in Congress. If any State shall exclude any of her adult m
ale citizens from the elective franchise, or abridge that right, she shall forfe
it her right to representation in the same proportion. The effect of this provis
ion will be either to compel the States to grant universal suffrage or so shear

them of their power as to keep them forever in a hopeless minority in the nation
al Government, both legislative and executive.[37]