Like many other Americans, I was (to paraphrase Jackie Chiles)  shocked and chagrined, mortified and stupefied by the debacle of our national elections—the conditions in the Florida elections specifically were excessive, egregious,... PREPOSTEROUS!   But I soon realized this election may perhaps be a great bellwether for future elections, and in turn could present very real new challenges (and opportunities) for our American brand of democracy. To put it mildly, this is the best thing to happen to the way our country holds its elections in its 200+ year history.

“Wait, how can that be? I thought the debacle in Florida was terrible! And what about New Hampshire, New Mexico, Oregon, etc.?” At first, this election may have appeared to retard the best intentions of our democratic processes. And certainly, it has created in many Americans a strong distaste for that rather curious animal, the Electoral College.  But you may recall that our current method for electing our most important politicians is not the one first envisioned by our founding fathers, one which this editor has been pining for much more in recent days. Time for a quick history lesson:
American democracy is not founded on the idea of efficiency, by any means. Rather, American democracy was intentionally created to be slow, methodical, and highly inefficient. Had our founders wanted efficiency, and if efficiency equals simplicity, then we would have placed our faith in a Great Despotism, rather than our Great Republic.

And a republic it is (or was). Many of the founding fathers, Jefferson and Hamilton among them, felt the average citizen was neither educated not enlightened enough to be trusted with a vote. And even those deemed worthy, the great landowning aristocrats of the late 18th century, were only meant to vote for their Representatives in Congress. The Senate was filled by the state legislatures, and indeed, Senators were not elected by popular vote until the 17th Amendment was passed,....in 1913!
What about the Presidency? The electoral college was created to elect our President. The reason for its inception was political expediency. Firstly, it was meant to placate the South—slaves were partially counted in the census (they were considered to be 3/5’s of one person) to determine the number of representatives the southern states could send to Congress, yet slaves could not vote. Besides, how do you count 3/5’s of a person in an election? You don’t; you simply use them to magnify the votes cast by the white landowners, which are used to elect electors to the electoral college.

The other major reason for an electoral was the compromise in the creation of the Congress—divided into a House and Senate to preserve the power of both large and small states. Small states clamored to have a greater voice in Presidential elections. Small states with only one Congressman in the House (called an “at-large-Congressman”), would have little if any influence in an election were it not for the two “freebie” electoral votes they get for their senators. Electoral votes are given to each state based on the number of representatives and Senators they send to Congress. So, small states like Wyoming, which have only a very small population, have their voting power effectively trebled in a national election (because even the smallest states still get two senators).

The founders of our Republic were not creatures of party, like our modern politicians. They did not envision a government ruled by political parties, and crafted the methodology for electing our President with that belief in mind. Electors were meant to balance the will of the public—expressed through a popular vote for President—with their own intelligence and wisdom; this was meant to avoid the election of a corrupt yet popular demagogue (Hitler, Mussolini, FDR, etc.). The founders envisioned the electoral college splitting its vote between the top three Presidential candidates, in EVERY ELECTION! Nearly all elections would go to the House of Representatives, or so it was planned; the House would then pick a President and Vice President from these three choices. Clearly this was not an efficient or quick system—it was well before electronic counting of votes—and it was very much removed from the hands of the common man.

All fine and good you say, but what does an antiquated vision of an obsolete Republic have to do with this election here and now, in the year 2000? The House and Senate are elected popularly, women and minorities can vote, as can the poor and uneducated, and the Electoral College hasn’t defied the popular vote since the election of Benjamin Harrison over Grover Cleveland in 1888 (though the 1960 election of Kennedy over Nixon is debatable). If anything, our nation is more a democracy than a Republic, no matter what the intentions of our founding fathers were. So who cares what the system was like 200 years ago?

I do, for one, and that is why this election is so great—it is a reminder to all of us that we were never meant to vote for the President in the first place— and we still don’t. Had Bush “won” Michigan, two of his electors would have been Governor John Engler and Senator Spencer Abraham—so, when I voted straight ticket Republican, as I always do, I really cast a vote for Engler, Spence, or one of 16 other Electoral College candidates and not for G.W. Bush.

If this election does nothing other than elect one of two very unqualified individuals to the highest office in the land, I hope it teaches people what their vote really means. Firstly, there is nothing inherent in our system to support the dominance of the two parties other than tradition and habit, and ignorance. As was demonstrated in this election, it would be relatively easy for a third party candidate to draw a substantial number of electoral votes, and cause the election to go the House. Let’s play with this idea, and see where it takes us:

Firstly, if any party has a chance of taking off big on the national scene, it is the Green Party. Most other democracies in the West have strong and well-established Green parties, and they are very popular with the new generation of neo-liberals coming of age throughout the industrialized democracies of Europe and North America. So, let’s say a Green candidate comes on the scene to galvanize the American Greens, and he wins the popular vote in Green-friendly states like Washington and California. If no candidate gets more than 269 electoral votes, the election is decided in the House of Representatives—thus if our candidate wins enough electoral votes, he can force the election into the House (where it was meant to go anyway). By this time, assuming our candidate had any coattails at all, and if the Greens are an established party, there are likely a few Greens in the House. So, our candidate could trade his Congressmen’s votes to the Democrats to elect a Democrat to the White House—in return, the Democrats agree to a Congress ruled by a coalition of Greens and Democrats (common in Europe, but unheard of in America), wherein several key leadership posts would be filled by Greens!

Imagine if the “coalition whip,” as well as several key committee chairmen were Greens; anyone want to take a bet the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) would see its operating budget quadruple? Or that there might be some serious opposition to the continuing use of nuclear power by U.S. power utilities? Or that there might be intense pressure for further nuclear disarmament? Or what if the success of the Greens invigorated other groups to form third parties—what if the Right Wing of the GOP, the so-called “Religious Right,” was incensed by the nomination of a moderate like John McCain and decided to branch off and form their own party? Maybe the “American Christian Republicans?” Or perhaps new minority parties, say, like the “United Latino Front” or “African American Equality Party?”

All of this is, in my opinion, becoming more likely (if not inevitable) in post Cold War America—demographic shifts, new ideologies, the “New Economy,” and increasing globalization are all quickly changing the political flavor of our Republic. Perhaps the Founding Fathers were right—maybe democracy is not the way to go. I see weak Congressional coalitions, Presidents lacking strong majority support, and increasing bureaucratic deadlock in our future. Yet perhaps this is the only way our Great Republic can survive into the 21st century. In any case, we can expect interesting political changes in our country in the years to come, if not an outright end to the stagnant two-party system which has entrenched itself in our national identity. Nightmare it could be, but I am an optimist, in the vein of my generation; let’s embrace this change and see where it takes us. God save the Republic!