MISSOULA — The Electoral College has been involved in the American election system since the Constitution was ratified by the 13 original colonies.
Lee Banville, University of Montana School of Journalism Director, professor and political Analyst explained what the Electoral College system is and why it was created.
“The idea was that that people don't elect the president, there's a representative system that sort of exists between an individual voter, voting for somebody and who becomes president. And so the Electoral College was a method to ensure that all the states had a say in who became the president,” Banville said.
Banville also explained that when you vote you are also voting for the electors that participate in the Electoral College process.
“Each state is assigned a number of electors. They are people. So, when you vote in Montana for Donald Trump or for Kamala Harris, you're actually voting for a slate of electors. Four of them who would then go and show up at this meeting at the Capitol and actually cast their ballots for one president or the other. And so, the idea was that you would sort of ensure representation of all states, and not just the popular states,” Banville told MTN.
Why not just the popular vote? Banville says that the less populated states would not have as big of a say in electing a president as other states would.
“If it was just a popular vote, you could kind of win by going to New York and California and Texas or a couple big states with lots of population and voice," Banville said. "And voices like Montana would be drowned out, because there just aren't as many people here as there are in like Fairfax County, Virginia. And so, we just don't compete when it comes to population. And the Electoral College was sort of built to ensure that those voices that were sort of more rural, more sparsely populated, had a voice in the picking of the President,” Banville said.
Since Montana grew in population, another congressional seat was gained in 2022. That means four electoral voters will now cast their ballots based on the general vote outcome in the state for the presidency.
“There are many races on the ballot where they literally are voting for one candidate or the other, and especially there's so much attention being spent on seven states. If an individual Montanan votes one way or the other, it probably won't change the four votes that come from Montana and go to one president, presidential candidate or the other," Banville noted. "They're probably going to Donald Trump no matter what, but their voice on, you know, like, for example, in Missoula, we had a race that literally tied, and so one person changing their mind would have changed the outcome."
There are other elections that are on the November ballot that matter strictly by majority voting.
“These races — especially what we call down ballot below the president — are often incredibly shaped by the number of people who choose to show up on election day," Banville explained. "And so, their voices can be incredibly significant, although it's a little bit muted when it comes to the president because of the Electoral College. It is odd that we don't actually vote for the president...but that doesn't mean that the so and sometimes electors can go completely rogue and change the way they vote.
The Electoral College was a major topic of conversation after the 2016 election, but Banville says while the general public doesn’t actually vote for the office of the presidency, electoral voters typically vote the way that the state general election outcome is.
“I think one of the biggest misconceptions is that that your vote doesn't matter, that you really aren't voting for president, that anything could happen once, once that person goes into the Electoral College meeting,” Banville said. “They really are going to go and cast their ballots in the way that that the state has asked them to do that and so I think that any sort of fear that if you vote one way or the other, that somehow your vote's not going to matter, or it's not going to show up in the way you want it to.”
Banville explained the Electoral College votes are decided based on population.
“Other people have lost Electoral College votes as populations have dropped, but basically, it's set by the number of Congressional districts you have. So, each state gets two and then you get one more for each congressional district you have,” Banville said.
While there are two states that split up their Electoral Votes, 48 other states and Washington D.C. have a winner-takes-all all system.
“The Electoral College tends to represent your state quite well, but right now, for most states, it's winner take,” Banville said.
