The Electoral College debate is another political football used to divide our nation and preoccupy us while The Man (a name I use in To Pimp a Nation to designate America’s oppressive forces) continues to steal the fruits of our productivity. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tweeted her support for abolishing the Electoral College and it confuses me why. I see her as sincere and perhaps having the most integrity of any member in Congress so why would she advocate such a potentially destructive policy? Here’s my question:
Why would any politician advocate a policy that could destroy our union?
From my perspective, the Electoral College’s purpose is to give all states in the union sufficient say-so in Presidential elections. Without it the popular vote would rule and the smaller states would have significantly less influence on determining who leads our nation. One sticking point America’s forefathers experienced when forming our union was smaller states’ concern of having less say-so and thus being subject to the will of the larger ones. Leaders of larger population states wanted a popular vote and leaders of smaller ones wanted equal votes. Their solution on July 16th1787 was the “Great Compromise,” where they decided to do both. They created the lower house of Congress, where membership is proportional to a state’s population, and the upper house, known as the Senate, where each state only gets two. Absent the lower house, which is like a popular vote, or the Senate, which is like an electoral college vote, we’d have no union. So it’s safe to say that if we needed sufficiently proportioned representation to form the American union, not having it could destroy it.
Imagine this hypothetical scenario: An Electoral-College-free America elects Kamala Harris as President. She has already declared that if Congress doesn’t put a gun safety bill on her desk within the first 100 days, she would start signing executive orders. With Congress being unable to pass any significant gun regulation bills, she tries to force compromise by signing an executive order creating a Federal gun ban. Places like Alaska would immediately feel disenfranchised as the executive order’s constitutionality is tried in the courts. They’d also be inclined to leave the union rather than disarm. Alaska needs guns for protection and sustenance yet only have a population of 700,000 vs California’s 39 million so this scenario would seem to them like large states imposing their will on them. In this situation the US would likely sanction Alaska causing them to trade with other countries such as Russia or China. This would mean an alliance and some type of protectorate function. In this far-fetched scenario we would have Russian or Chinese troops on the North American continent and thus be dramatically less secure. Provided that the Dakotas, Delaware, Idaho, Maine, Montana, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Vermont, West Virginia and Wyoming have similar circumstances to Alaska, eliminating the Electoral College leaves a lot of room to break up the union and for us to be infiltrated by a foreign force.
On June 2nd, 1787, John Dickinson, known as the Penman of the American Revolution, said that America’s “accidental lucky division into distinct states” was a remedy for the disease that made other large European empires flourish for a moment and vanish.” Some I’ve debated on twitter seem to feel we could lose a state or two if they choose to reject a popular vote electoral system. Mark my words: This would be the end of the United States.
The purpose of my blogs is to spur conversation so here’s my idea: How about forming a three-tiered electoral system just like we do with lawmaking. In such a system, our President would be chosen by the Popular vote, the Electoral College vote and the third deciding factor would be the Minority vote, which would include white women and gay white males, who are, too, minorities. Statedly straight white males, the only portion of the electorate that can’t be designated a “minority,” have enjoyed the vast majority of influence on American policy and one could make the case that the Electoral College formed in reaction to the broadening of voting rights outside of the “majority” class’ realm; historically, America’s policies have benefitted them at the expense of others. A three-tiered electoral system would prevent mistakes like Donald Trump’s presidency from happening again yet compliment American’s sentiment when popular and Electoral College votes are in sync. We have to admit that Trump’s 2016 victory was a combination of white males and those they influence’s discontent with his predecessor mixed with lack of enthusiasm for the Democratic candidate who, because of her endorsements of white males’ agenda in the 1990s, couldn’t gain 79,000 black votes in key electoral districts. In other words it is solely due to those that can’t be called a “minority” that America is in its current predicament. It is also mainly this group compromising America’s fundamental structure to keep Donald Trump in power. Bill Barr tied Robert Mueller’s hands behind his back by declaring that a sitting President was immune to law. Moscow Mitch McConnell will not allow a vote on legislation that would protect our elections from Russian influence. He has also denied a bill requiring back up paper ballots in our national elections. To counter this hoarding of American justice and make our laws behave as if they are truly for “the people,” meaning all of us, we have to undo non-minority’s built in advantage by actually giving the others the power to make this change. A three-tiered voting system would quell the Electoral College debate and move America in the direction of what it claims to be yet can never seem to achieve.