1 00:00:00,900 --> 00:00:05,120 I want to talk you about the Electoral College and why it matters. 2 00:00:05,120 --> 00:00:08,520 Alright, I know this doesn't sound the like most sensational topic of the day, 3 00:00:08,520 --> 00:00:13,280 but, stay with me because, I promise you, it's one of the most important. 4 00:00:13,280 --> 00:00:17,160 To explain why requires a very brief civics review. 5 00:00:17,160 --> 00:00:22,100 The President and Vice President of the United States are not chosen by a nationwide, 6 00:00:22,100 --> 00:00:28,220 popular vote of the American people; rather, they are chosen by 538 electors. 7 00:00:28,220 --> 00:00:32,480 This process is spelled out in the United States Constitution. 8 00:00:32,480 --> 00:00:36,200 Why didn't the Founders just make it easy, and let the Presidential candidate with the 9 00:00:36,200 --> 00:00:43,780 most votes claim victory? Why did they create, and why do we continue to need, this Electoral College? 10 00:00:43,780 --> 00:00:50,960 The answer is critical to understanding not only the Electoral College, but also America. 11 00:00:50,960 --> 00:00:56,560 The Founders had no intention of creating a pure majority-rule democracy. 12 00:00:56,560 --> 00:01:02,960 They knew from careful study of history what most have forgotten today, or never learned: 13 00:01:02,960 --> 00:01:05,660 pure democracies do not work. 14 00:01:05,660 --> 00:01:07,700 They implode. 15 00:01:07,700 --> 00:01:12,620 Democracy has been colorfully described as two wolves and a lamb voting on what's for dinner. 16 00:01:12,620 --> 00:01:18,320 In a pure democracy, bare majorities can easily tyrannize the rest of a country. 17 00:01:18,320 --> 00:01:21,780 The Founders wanted to avoid this at all costs. 18 00:01:21,780 --> 00:01:27,880 This is why we have three branches of government -- Executive, Legislative and Judicial. 19 00:01:27,880 --> 00:01:33,540 It's why each state has two Senators no matter what its population, but also different numbers 20 00:01:33,540 --> 00:01:39,080 of Representatives based entirely on population. It's why it takes a supermajority in Congress 21 00:01:39,080 --> 00:01:42,880 and three-quarters of the states to change the Constitution. 22 00:01:42,880 --> 00:01:45,920 And, it's why we have the Electoral College. 23 00:01:45,920 --> 00:01:48,560 Here's how the Electoral College works. 24 00:01:48,560 --> 00:01:54,400 The Presidential election happens in two phases. The first phase is purely democratic. 25 00:01:54,400 --> 00:02:02,400 We hold 51 popular elections every presidential election year: one in each state and one in D.C. 26 00:02:02,400 --> 00:02:07,740 On Election Day in 2012, you may have thought you were voting for Barack Obama or Mitt Romney, 27 00:02:07,740 --> 00:02:13,220 but you were really voting for a slate of presidential electors. In Rhode Island, for example, 28 00:02:13,220 --> 00:02:18,340 if you voted for Barack Obama, you voted for the state's four Democratic electors; 29 00:02:18,340 --> 00:02:23,760 if you voted for Mitt Romney you were really voting for the state's four Republican electors. 30 00:02:23,760 --> 00:02:28,420 Part Two of the election is held in December. And it is this December election among the 31 00:02:28,420 --> 00:02:34,140 states' 538 electors, not the November election, which officially determines the identity 32 00:02:34,140 --> 00:02:39,280 of the next President. At least 270 votes are needed to win. 33 00:02:39,280 --> 00:02:41,400 Why is this so important? 34 00:02:41,400 --> 00:02:46,820 Because the system encourages coalition-building and national campaigning. In order to win, 35 00:02:46,820 --> 00:02:52,780 a candidate must have the support of many different types of voters, from various parts of the country. 36 00:02:52,780 --> 00:02:58,760 Winning only the South or the Midwest is not good enough. You cannot win 270 electoral 37 00:02:58,770 --> 00:03:02,610 votes if only one part of the country is supporting you. 38 00:03:02,610 --> 00:03:06,980 But if winning were only about getting the most votes, a candidate might concentrate 39 00:03:06,980 --> 00:03:11,540 all of his efforts in the biggest cities or the biggest states. Why would that candidate 40 00:03:11,540 --> 00:03:15,660 care about what people in West Virginia or Iowa or Montana think? 41 00:03:15,660 --> 00:03:20,660 But, you might ask, isn't the election really only about the so-called swing states? 42 00:03:20,660 --> 00:03:26,360 Actually, no. If nothing else, safe and swing states are constantly changing. 43 00:03:26,360 --> 00:03:33,000 California voted safely Republican as recently as 1988. Texas used to vote Democrat. 44 00:03:33,000 --> 00:03:37,080 Neither New Hampshire nor Virginia used to be swing states. 45 00:03:37,080 --> 00:03:43,140 Most people think that George W. Bush won the 2000 election because of Florida. Well, sort of. 46 00:03:43,140 --> 00:03:47,160 But he really won the election because he managed to flip one state which the Democrats 47 00:03:47,160 --> 00:03:53,220 thought was safe: West Virginia. Its 4 electoral votes turned out to be decisive. 48 00:03:53,220 --> 00:03:58,440 No political party can ignore any state for too long without suffering the consequences. 49 00:03:58,440 --> 00:04:04,280 Every state, and therefore every voter in every state, is important. 50 00:04:04,280 --> 00:04:09,180 The Electoral College also makes it harder to steal elections. Votes must be stolen in 51 00:04:09,190 --> 00:04:13,290 the right state in order to change the outcome of the Electoral College. 52 00:04:13,290 --> 00:04:17,830 With so many swing states, this is hard to predict and hard to do. 53 00:04:17,830 --> 00:04:22,500 But without the Electoral College, any vote stolen in any precinct in the country could 54 00:04:22,500 --> 00:04:28,120 affect the national outcome -- even if that vote was easily stolen in the bluest California 55 00:04:28,120 --> 00:04:31,500 precinct or the reddest Texas one. 56 00:04:31,500 --> 00:04:36,040 The Electoral College is an ingenious method of selecting a President for a great, 57 00:04:36,040 --> 00:04:40,860 diverse republic such as our own -- it protects against the tyranny of the majority, 58 00:04:40,860 --> 00:04:44,600 encourages coalition building and discourages voter fraud. 59 00:04:44,600 --> 00:04:48,480 Our Founders were proud of it! We can be too. 60 00:04:48,480 --> 00:04:51,760 I'm Tara Ross for Prager University.