WPC partners with The Heritage Foundation on a new study that explains how repealing our current election system would disenfranchise people living in small and mid-sized states

Key Findings

1. The U.S. has the most successful electoral system in the world, with the widestpossible voting for nearly all citizens over age 18.

2. One reason American democracy is so successful is that people choose the president through 50 state elections, ensuring that every vote matters.

3. Voting by state means everyone’s vote counts, whether they live in a large state, like California, or a small one, like Wyoming.

4. Some presidential candidates “waste” their support by getting a surplus of votes in a few large states, while failing to win enough states overall to prevail in the electoral college.

5. When their favored candidate loses, critics want to repeal the electoral college and take any meaningful vote away from residents of mid-sized and small states.

6. When their favored candidate wins, however, they say the system works just fine.

7. Repealing the electoral college would disenfranchise residents of small and mid-size states, since only votes in the large states would determine the outcome of the elections.

Introduction

The United States is a uniquely successful democracy. Over a period of 244 years, it has extended voting and self-government to more people over more generations than any other country in the history of the world. There is a reason government of, for and by the people has worked so well in America. The United States has the most successful electoral system of any country, with the most open and widest-possible opportunity for voting frequently at all levels of government, and with almost no voting restrictions for any citizen 18 years of age and older.1 Further, the U.S. has expanded the franchise in every national election, with more people voting each time than ever before. The success of U.S. elections is described in a new study from Washington Policy Center and the Heritage Foundation called “The Essential Electoral College,” which explains in clear terms how Americans choose their president.

Read the full Policy Note here.

Read the full Heritage Foundation study here.