History, Politics

Odds Are Against It

Click to see original imageGiven the vagaries of the American electoral system. it’s still possible the Nov. 4 presidential election could wind up in the House of Representatives for a decision.

But the odds are against it. The route the Constitution provides when no presidential candidate receives a majority of the electoral votes has been required only twice in the republic’s history.
Indeed. that part of the election machinery hasn’t been called into play for 156 years – not in 39 presidential elections since 1824.

With independent John Anderson a viable candidate along with the two major party nominees – incumbent Jimmy Carter and challenger Ronald Reagan – the odds are improved an appreciable extent for the shuffle of electoral votes that just could cause history to repeat itself.

The most recent strong third party presidential candidate was Alabama Gov, George Wallace. Running on the American independent Party ticket in 1968. he captured 18.5 percent of the popular vote and 46 electoral votes.
Republican Richard M. Nixon won the 301 electoral votes to 191 for Democrat Hubert Humphrey although barely winning the popular vote.

Had results in a few hotlycontested states been reversed, that presidential election might have ended up in the House. As it was. it sparked anew the intermittent controversy over the Electoral College system – whether it should be abolished … or at least amended.

The first time the House was called upon to decide a presidential election came when Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr received equal votes in 1800. The House chose Jefferson as the third U.S. president. with Burr as vice president.
In those days the candidate with the most votes was to be president and the second high man vice president. To correct the flaw, the 12th Amendment in 1804 separated the two offices on the ballot.

In 1824, when Andrew Jackson, John Quincy Adams, William H. Crawford and Henry Clay finished in that order with no electoral vote majority. the House picked Adams to be the sixth president.
Under the Electoral College, two other presidents – Rutherford B. Hayes in 1876 and Benjamin Harrison in 1888 won the presidency though losing the popular vote.

When American citizens go to the polls, instead of voting directly for president and vice president, they choose “‘electors” who cast the electoral votes at mid-December meetings in state capitals.

The returns are tabulated before Congress Jan. 6, by law. If no candidate has an electoral vote majority, the state delegations in the House choose the president from the top three candidates.

Each state has only one vote in this process – and a majority of states – now 26 – is required for election. The Senate chooses the vice presldent in a similar procedure in case of deadlock.

A state has as many electoral votes as it has senators and representatives in Congress. Amendment 23. ratified in 1961, gave the District of Columbia three votes. The electoral votes. 538 altogether, are awarded victorious candidates in the popular vote on a winner-take-all basis in all states except Maine.

In the 1876 election, Samual J. Tilden led Hayes by nearly 250,000 votes in citizen balloting, but lost by one electoral vote.

Grover Cleveland, in the 1888 election, had nearly 100.000 votes more than Benjamin Harrison – but Harrison carried New York with its big package of electoral votes and came off the winner.

Interestingly, in 12 other presidential elections, the winners, though leading the popular vote, gained only a “plurality,” failing to garner a majority of votes cast for all candidates.

These were James Polk in 1844, Zachary Taylor in 1848, James Buchanan in 1856, Abraham Lincoln in 1860 but not in 1864, James A. Garfield in 1880, Grover Cleveland in 1884 and 1892, Woodrow Wilson in 1912 and 1916, Harry Truman in 1948, John F. Kennedy in 1960, and Richard M. Nixon in 1968 but not in 1972.