ELECTORAL COLLEGES

Chronicle (Levin), 4 November 1948, Page 5

ELECTORAL COLLEGES

Election of Governors, Representatives and Senators is determined by majority. The Presidential and VicePresidential elections are deeided by the Electoral College system. Teehnically, the mah who gets the largest number of votes its not neeessarily elected President. Voters do not ballot directly for the Presidential candidate, but for elec.tors to represent the will of each of the forty-eight States. The Presidential candidate who received a majority of the votes of . individuals in a State is given the entire electoral votes of that State. Thus, whether 51 per cent. or 99 per cent. Of votes in Illinois are cast for, say, Thomas Dewey, the State 's entire Electoral College vote goes to Mr. Dewey — 28 votes in the case of Illinois. This system of Electoral College votes, which confuses many Americans and most foreigners, was designed by the eighteenth century drafters of the United States Constitution as a means of protecting thn rights of small States. In modern practice it means that candidates for the Presidency tend to concentrate their electoral cafnpaigns in certain key States which have large numbers of votes in the Electoral College. New York, for instance, has 47' of the 531 electoral votes. A candidate, to win the Presidency, requires 266 electoral votes, hence States sueh as New York, Pennsylvania (35 electoral votes), Illinois (28), California (25), Ohio (25) and Texas (23) assume vital importance in the Presidential eampaign.