WHEN AMERICA GOES TO THE POLL

Taupo Times, Volume I, Issue 20, 28 May 1952, Page 7

WHEN AMERICA GOES TO THE POLL

How The National Elections Are Run. W1 len the people of the Unitecl | States go to the polling plaees on ! Novmber 4 to vote for their chosen candiclatesfor President and Vice President, they will be exercising their right of personal participation in democi'atic government. This public I or "popular ' vote on election day — ■ i the first Tuesday after the fir^t Mon- j day in November every four years — • : is the third of four major steps re- | quired to select the men for the high- : est elective offiees in the country. The first two steps are: (1) the primaries or state party conventions, where delegates to the national party conventicns are elected or nhmed, and (2) the national conventions, themselves, at which the party candi- 1 f dates for President and Vice Pres- j dent are chosen. It is the third step, | the actual castmg of the ballot on j election day; which is eonsidered as the most important, by the citizens of j the United States, far outweighing the preliminary as well as the final and fourth step, the electoral vote. This final step constitutes a "historical vestige" of a practice followed in v the early days of the American Republic, and fchus has hecome almost a mere formality. The "electoral college" system, as it is caiied was set up by the framers of the Constitution in ^ 1787 in keeping with a situation prevailing at the time, but has long since disappeared. At that time, edueationai facilities had not become widespread and a good education had been achieved by relatively few men. Therefore, the framers of the Constitution sought to entrust the final selection of men to fill the most important offiees of government to those having the best knowledge and experienee. The Constitution provided that these men known as "electors" were to be chosen in each State ito a manner prescribed. by mdiyidual State legislatures. Thus, an "mdirect" election pro- * cedure was created, with the ^people of each State voting for electoisrather than for a candidate for President, and witb the electors rather, and with the electors free to make their own decisions in casting their votes. The members of each State's winning1 group of electors were to meet on a designated day in December, cast their votes and send them to the President of the Senate at the national Capitol. Plere they were to be opened and the wimiing candidate for President determined. This early method was actually follo\ved only for the first five presidential elections. The people began following the practice of voting for an elector only after he had pledged himself in advance to vote for the man of their choice. Then, in 1808, one of the parties adopted the principle that the party's choice for President bound all electors nominated by the party. That decision, immediately adopted by other parties, transferred election power directly to the voters within each State. However, the Constitutional electoral laws has never been changed, and the forms of delegated choice continue. The actual working of the "electoral cqllege" procedure in elections today is fairly simpfe. First, the individual ballots cast for each party's candidate for President are totalled in each State. Since the party's candidate for Vice President -automatieally receives the same number of votes as its Presidential candidate; no separate Vice-Presidential tally is made. The candidate for President obtaining the most votes (plurality) in each State is eonsidered to be the choice of the entire State. As a result, the winning candidate gets the State's entire block of electoral votes. Because a candidate who wins a

State's popular vote byr even th' smallest margin also wins its entir electoral vote therc may be a wid gap between his percentage of th national "popular vote" in the booth on election day, and the "electora vote" decided at the Conventions. I the 1940 election, for example, th late President Roosevelt was th choice of 55 per cent. of the indi vidual voters, but won 84 per cent oi the electoral vote.