Revisiting the Electoral College Compromise

Criticized as outdated and undemocratic, the Electoral College was originally crafted to balance popular will, state equality, and constitutional restraint.

2016 presidential election results by congressional district, depicting the popular vote margin. Wikimedia CC-SA 4.0

“I think the Electoral College is an absurd 18th-century construct,” author David Remnick said in a 2016 interview with Spiegel International.

He’s not alone in that belief. It’s “made our society less and less democratic,” Pete Buttigieg said during his 2020 presidential campaign. Bayard Rustin, a 20th-century political activist, wrote that it’s “potentially very dangerous.”