You Can’t Go Back

My good friend Bryan Fischer at the Idaho Values Alliance longs to a return to founding principles regarding Presidential elections, writing:

In a pure democracy, we would elect our president by the simple, straightforward rule of the majority. Whoever gets the most votes, wins. (Most Americans mistakenly believe this is how we elect our presidents today.)

But that’s not the system the Founders left us. The Constitution establishes the principle that the people do not in fact directly elect the president of the United States. What they do is elect the Electors who in turn select the president of the United States.

If you paid attention, you would have noticed in tiny print the names of the Electors (see ballot here) you were in fact voting for on your November ballot. Those of you who thought you were voting for John McCain were in actuality voting for Darlene Bramon, Ben Doty, John Erickson, and Melinda Smyser. Surprised?

These electors, in our current system, are not picked by the people, as the Founders intended, but rather by political parties, usually as an honorary reward for faithful service to the party rather than for any particular political acumen they may have.

While the rapid emergence of the two-party system led to the 12th Amendment and ultimately obliterated the Electoral College system for all practical purposes, if we returned to the vision of the Founders, we would not elect a president on the first Tuesday in November but rather we would elect those who would elect our next president for us.

In other words, you would not find the name of any presidential candidates on our November ballots. Instead you would find the names of candidates for the temporary office of Elector.

And the campaigns leading up to the November vote would not be trillion dollar campaigns for the presidency, but 538 separate campaigns for the office of Elector…

These candidates for Elector would spend the campaign season – preferably each in their own congressional district, with two at-large Electors (representing each state’s senators) campaigning statewide – telling us why they should be trusted with the enormous responsibility of selecting the next leader of the free world, and then we would choose those Electors who in our view were determined to select someone with the public policy convictions we want in a president.

One candidate for Elector might say, “I can’t tell you at this point who I will vote for, but my pledge to you is that I will vote for the man (generic use) who in my judgment will most effectively work for smaller government, lower taxes, less regulation, a strong national defense, and traditional moral values.”

His opponent might say, “I will vote for the candidate who has the most confidence in government programs to solve social ills, and who will enlarge the role of government intervention in society.” Then the people pick which of the two (or more) electoral candidates they most trust to vote for a president on their behalf.

As Alexander Hamilton said in the Federalist Papers (No. 68), Electors were to be chosen for the “temporary and sole purpose of making the appointment” of the nation’s president. “(T)he immediate election,” he added, “should be made by men most capable of analyzing the qualities adapted to the station,” those “most likely to possess the information and discernment requisite” to make such an important choice.

One thing is for certain, if we went back to the Founders’ model, there is no way that 88% of these Electors, for example, would have no awareness that a candidate had openly declared that his policies would intentionally bankrupt a major industry that every American depends on. They might choose to ignore that fact, but they would certainly hear about during those six weeks.

Fischer argues quite convincingly that Presidential Campaigns would be far less expensive and less lengthy affairs producing a more informed result. I tend to agree with him, but unfortunately, this is a reform that will never happen.

Both the popular election of Presidential Candidates and the direct election of Senators have not been good for the Republic and have tampered in an unhelpful way with the ingenius blueprint the founders gave us. These changes have led to the expensive mega-campaigns for the U.S. Senate and the presidency. It has disempowered State Governments. The founders’ careful balance of a Republican government has been shaken with only a few vestiges (such as the Electoral College) left.

The House was elected by the people directly, the U.S. Senate was elected by the legislature, with the President not elected directly. Thus, we had all power ultimately coming from the people, but not flowing from them directly. Instead, we’ve got an ever-increasing number of offices people vote on directly and never-ending campaigns. The founder’s system would be easier.

However, it is less democratic and so, even if it makes our system more expensive, corrupt, and complicated, and also empowers and strengthens the central government, special interests, and those with deep pockets, we’ll keep the current system. It’s too culturally ingrained after so many years. You have to pick your battles, and this is one issue we will not be able to turn back.