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Electoral College: Electoral Votes
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Electoral College projections based on state polls ... show a dead heat. Projections assuming that undecided voters will break for the challenger in typical proportions give Mr. Kerry more than 300 electoral votes.
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Because the apportionment of Electoral College voters is based indirectly on the Census, several states have gained or lost votes for the 2004 and 2008 elections. Florida, a key state in 2000, cast 25 electoral votes that year; this year it will have 27.
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The mysteries of the Electoral College has enabled Pennsylvania to play an unusually major role in determining who is President. In 1796, Thomas Jefferson defeated John Adams in Pennsylvania’s popular election by only 62 votes, but the Pennsylvania electors gave Jefferson 14 votes and Adams 1, though Adams did win the Electoral vote, 71 to 68.
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The workings of the electoral college have not gone unchallenged. The controversial presidential election of 1876 pitted Republican Rutherford B. Hayes, a former governor of Ohio, against Democrat Samuel J. Tilden, a former governor of New York. Reacting against the Reconstruction measures of Republicans in the South, Tilden received strong support from Southern Democrats. When the election returns came in on November 7, 1876, Tilden had clearly received the majority of the popular votes. However, Republicans determined that if they challenged the outcome of the voting in key areas of Florida, Louisiana, and South Carolina, Hayes could win. The Republicans sought victory at all costs and went all out to claim the electoral votes from those states as their own.
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Electoral Votes are awarded on a state level, on a winner-take-all basis (except for Maine and Nebraska, which award two electoral votes to the statewide winner and remaining electoral votes to the winner in each congressional district). Even if a state race is extremely close, the winner receives all of the state's Electoral Votes. In 2000, one little-known fact is that Gore won more of the closest states than Bush did - five of the top seven closest states, or six of the top seven if you count Florida. This is seen as an inequity by many, or just part of the strategy by others.
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Many people dislike the electoral college system. They think it is wrong for the winning party in a state to get all the electoral votes and the losing party none. The victor may win several large states by just a few popular votes. But even this small margin wins all the state's electoral votes. The opponent, on the other hand, may win large popular majorities in several smaller states with few electoral votes. Thus a person may lose the nationwide popular vote and still be elected president.
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Electoral Votes