Electoral College Spirit
AP U.S. Government and Politics
Which tend to be closer, popular votes or electoral votes?
How accurate was your prediction?
What is the big story this chart tells about popular versus electoral votes?
How does the electoral college magnify a small popular vote victory into a landslide?
Is that a good thing?
There have been four times in American political history where because of the electoral college, the person who got less popular votes than their opponent won the presidency (1876, 1888, 2000, 2016).*And if you really want to go down an electoral college rabbit hole, you can check out the election of 1824! But if you look at the chart above you'll see that there have been many more than four times that the person who won the presidency didn't get a majority of the popular vote. How do you explain this?
What is one positive consequence of the electoral college?
What is one negative consequence of the electoral college?
Do you think that the US would be better off without the electoral college?
Why do we have an electoral college anyway?
If a popular vote makes sense for gubernatorial elections, why doesn’t it make sense for presidential elections?
How did the electoral college impact our most recent presidential election?