2. If you could would you vote for this person
to be the President?
This is exactly why we have the Electoral
College system in place
The Framers of the Constitution feared the
masses ability to elect a person who might
bring down the nation
3. The U.S. Constitution
Article II of the Constitution spells out how the
President will be elected
The idea of an Electoral College system was to
create a safety net so that someone who isn’t really
qualified cannot become President of the U.S.
4. Political an organization of
Parties
A Political party is
people who hold similar views
They come together to work to put
their ideas into law
1 of the most important elections is
the Presidency
5. Political Parties
Each political party will hold a primary
(or first election) to determine which
candidate will represent their party in
the General Election
In the general election eligible
Americans vote for the next President
of the United States
6. Electoral College
How does it work?
After the General Election takes place the
electors from each state cast their votes for
the President and Vice President
There are 538 total electoral votes
To become President you must earn 270
electoral votes
7. How did the get the number
538 Electoral Votes?
35 members of the House of Representatives
among the States, based on the current
population.
100 members in the senate
Each State gets at least 3 electoral votes 1
electoral vote for each of its Representatives in
the House, and 1 electoral vote for each of its two
Senators.
The District of Columbia has 3 electoral votes
because the 23rd Amendment granted it the same
number of votes as the least populated State.
8. How do you determine the number of
electoral votes for each state?
The number of electoral votes allotted to each State is equivalent to the
number of Representatives and Senators that each State sends to
Congress.
New york has 31 members in congress
2 in the Senate 29 in the House of Representatives
New York has 31 ELECTORAL VOTES
9. Winner Take All
In 48 of the 50 states the candidate
with the most popular votes gets all of
the electoral votes of that state
10. U.S. Census
A census or count of the U.S. population is
taken every 10 years .
This is used to determine how many votes
each state has in Electoral College.
The distribution of electoral votes among the
States can vary every 10 years depending on
the results of the United States Census.
Example:
1990 census put New York at 33 electoral
