Electoral College Argumentative Essay

This is an assignment for my AP US Government class taught by Mr. Daniel Burns during the 2024-25 school year, which I enjoyed because, even though I knew a little bit about the United States's governmental structure, this class taught me so much more about it. This assignment is a practice argumentative essay that I had to do on the Electoral College. It is similar to the FRQs I later faced on the AP test.

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Although the Electoral College may appear to be an antiquated system and need to be abolished, it is deeply rooted in the structure of our electoral systems and that we can have an energetic, strong executive as described in Federalist 70. Article 2, Section 1, Clause 2 of the United States Constitution describes the Electoral College is used and the various aspects of the method that is used for the selection of electors, how the electors are supposed to choose a president. The fact that the Electoral College is explained in the Constitution shows its vitality inthat it shows that the method of selecting our president is deeply rooted in our electoral system.

If that system were to be changed, our whole system would have to be rearranged and Americans would have to familiarize themselves with the new method of electing presidents. This would cause issues for voters who might not know how the new voting process works. In Federalist 70, Alexander Hamilton describes how a country needs an “energetic,” single executive in order to create a quick response to any problems that may arise in America. The Electoral College system ensures that the executive is energetic because, in order to win, candidates must be able to withstand thousands of miles of travel while still being able to make a favorable impression on the people. If a candidate is not energetic, they would struggle to successfully travel throughout the country while impressing the people and making them desire that person to be their leader. While some people might claim that the Electoral College should be eliminated because it gives one candidate a certain amount of votes for a given state regardless of voter turnout. However, even though this perspective is understandable and logical, it is incorrect because, were this method of winning votes to be used, candidates would focus on states with larger populations, such as California, Texas, and New York, while ignoring states such as Alaska, Vermont, and Rhode Island. Since states receive a certain number of electoral votes regardless of voter turnout, candidates are motivated to visit states with both larger and smaller populations so as to collect as many votes as possible to ensure their victory. Smaller states are important in this system because, in a close election, one of them could be the difference between a candidate winning or losing.