Student’s Name
ENGL 1020-OL
Instructor’s Name
Date
The Electoral College
The American democratic system of government is heavily reliant on the American
people being able to elect their own leaders at all levels of government. The Founding Fathers
of America created a constitution that established a democratic government, eliminating the
monarchical type of government that the British used to rule over the colonies. Inspired by
Enlightenment thinking, the Founding Fathers created a system of government that gave the
people the power to decide who would be at the helm of the government. As Abraham
Lincoln famously stated at the Gettysburg address, democracy is “a government of the
people, for the people, by the people.” However, the American democratic system has been
labeled as being fundamentally undemocratic due to the Electoral College system of electing
the president. In modern-day America, the Electoral College should be abolished since it is in
violation of the fundamental democratic principle of the equality of votes.
The Electoral College was born out of a compromise created to both large and small
states happy. The Electoral College has aspects of the Great Compromise in it, and this
poisons its viability as a democratic system. During the Philadelphia convention, there was a
dispute between larger and smaller states, with each wanting different things, and the only
way to solve this conflict was the Electoral College System (West 1). While larger states
wanted representation in Congress to be based on population, smaller states wanted equal
representation. The result was the Great Compromise, which was greatly influenced by the
Three-fifths compromise. The Three-Fifths compromise led to only three-fifths of the
enslaved black population being counted towards the allocation of representatives in
ENGL 1020-OL
Instructor’s Name
Date
The Electoral College
The American democratic system of government is heavily reliant on the American
people being able to elect their own leaders at all levels of government. The Founding Fathers
of America created a constitution that established a democratic government, eliminating the
monarchical type of government that the British used to rule over the colonies. Inspired by
Enlightenment thinking, the Founding Fathers created a system of government that gave the
people the power to decide who would be at the helm of the government. As Abraham
Lincoln famously stated at the Gettysburg address, democracy is “a government of the
people, for the people, by the people.” However, the American democratic system has been
labeled as being fundamentally undemocratic due to the Electoral College system of electing
the president. In modern-day America, the Electoral College should be abolished since it is in
violation of the fundamental democratic principle of the equality of votes.
The Electoral College was born out of a compromise created to both large and small
states happy. The Electoral College has aspects of the Great Compromise in it, and this
poisons its viability as a democratic system. During the Philadelphia convention, there was a
dispute between larger and smaller states, with each wanting different things, and the only
way to solve this conflict was the Electoral College System (West 1). While larger states
wanted representation in Congress to be based on population, smaller states wanted equal
representation. The result was the Great Compromise, which was greatly influenced by the
Three-fifths compromise. The Three-Fifths compromise led to only three-fifths of the
enslaved black population being counted towards the allocation of representatives in
