If no presidential candidate receives a majority of electoral votes, the president is elected by?
404542
A. THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES\n\n\nITS IS CALLED\nMajority ? Plurality\n      A candidate must receive a majority of votes (over 50%) to become President. If no one has a majority, the person with the most votes has a plurality, but is not President.\n\n\n      The constitution includes a clause that guides the selection process in the event of a plurality. Article II, Section I states that "If the Electoral College does not give any candidate the necessary majority, the House of Representatives chooses the President from among the top three candidates in electoral votes. \n\n\nIn such a situation the House votes by states, with each state having one vote. To be elected president, a candidate must receive the votes from a majority of the states."\n\n\n      This clause has been used twice in the history of the United States. In 1800, when Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr tied for the presidency with 69 electoral votes each. After 36 ballots, Thomas Jefferson was elected the president of the United States. In 1824, Andrew Jackson led in electoral votes, but he did not have a majority. The House of Representatives elected John Quincy Adams as President after Henry Clay gave Adams his support.\n\n\nHOPE YOU UNDERSTOOD
14818
When a democratic president gets elected....
124774
"The Vice President of the United States shall be President of the Senate, but shall have no Vote, unless they be equally divided."  Article I, Section 3, Paragraph 4 of the U.S. Constitution.  The Senate also chooses a President pro tempore who service as President of the Senate when the VP is not around.\n\nTraditionally, the VP doesn't act as President of the Senate  unless there is the potential for a tie vote.  The President pro tem is the majority leader.
1023091
much like canadian mp's, americans have the house of representatives.  each state is assigned a certain number of representatives based on population.  the number of state representatives is equal to the number of electoral votes the state has.  lets say new york has 30 reps and hawaii has 2.  that is because new york has 15 times the population of hawaii.  each state gets the same number of votes that they have representatives.  these are called electoral votes.  whichever candidate receives the most votes in a particular state, the candidate gets the number of electoral votes.  if  bush got 51% of votes in new york, even though nearly half the state didnt like bush, he would get all 30 votes.
1038384
Why don't people ever get this? Don't they teach Civics in school anymore? Only 538 people voted in the Presidential Election. The rest of us voted for Electors. That's why it's called an Electoral College.\n\nDuh.
739402
wow zeeb that was a great help...\nanyways, its quite easy to understand. each state has a certain number of vote (known as the electoral votes) that are determined by there population. i.e. the more people the more votes. obviously a state like california or new york would have more votes than say alaska. its the number of votes that each state is given that is actually counted. and that certain number goes to which even president the state voted for. for example lets take california, which has 55 electoral votes, if the majority (60%) voted republican, then the 55 votes would go to the republican candidate. so therefore it is possible to win the popular vote and not become president as shown in the 2000 election i think? not sure...ill explain that too. \nlets say a country has 3 states. state A has 4 electoral votes and has 20,000 people state B has 10 electoral votes and has 50,000 and state C has 5 electoral votes and 30,000 people. 15,000 in state A vote for rep. and 5,000 vote for dem. in state B 30,000 vote for dem. and 20,000 vote for rep. in state C 25,000 vote for rep and 5,000 vote for dem\nSo we have: popular dem(40,000) rep. (60,000)\nand for the electoral votes(dem 10 because majority of state B vote for dem) and rep(9 because majority of state A and C vote of rep)\nso therefore the rep would have more popular vote but does not become president because he didnt win the electoral votes...\nhope that explained it and didnt make it more confusing
1046108
It works well, particularly in making smaller states matter. The majority of the states would stand to lose a significant amount of voting power if we went to a straight popular majority system. The president needs to represent the largest possible crossection of the country, which can't happen if he just caters to the large population centers, which is exactly what would happen without the electoral college.
1060432
a lot of people think that the electoral college is antiquated and no longer necessary and think that the president SHOULD get elected by popular vote.\n\nalso, in the vast majority of times, the electoral college and the popular vote match, so no one gets their panties in a wad until they don't.  \n\na lot of people don't know that the electors don't have to vote for what their state voted for.  Ohio went for bush on the popular side, but had the electors exercised their option and voted for Gore, there would be nothing the voters of Ohio could have done about it, and we'd have President Gore instead of President Bush today (since Ohio was the swing state this last time around)\n\n***please note that i have not expressed my own opinion, just what the issue is***
1080894
In 1876, the Republican candidate (Hayes) won the electoral college while narrowly losing the popular vote.\n\nIn 2000, the Republican candidate (Bush jr) won the electoral college while narrowly losing the popular vote.\n\nIn 1825, John Quincy Adams was elected by the House of Representatives, despite the fact that Andrew Jackson received the most popular and electoral votes in the 1824 election.  There was no majority at the Electoral College and the election was thrown to the House.  A deal between Adams and Henry Clay gave the election to Adams, and Clay was appointed Secretary of State.
117749
Because no one pays attention to the electoral college votes, and then when the electoral college votes someone crooked into politics you don't have a say... because your vote for preseident doesn't count... it all depends who your electoral representative votes for and he doesn't have to go with the votes of the state.
300526
This is because each state is allotted a certain number of "electoral votes."  It is based on the population of that state.  For example, NY State has 31 electoral votes.  After the population goes to vote and it's decided who the majority is, the electoral voters (those 31 people who represent our votes) go and cast our ballots.  \n\nNow it's a simple majority rules.  Say that the majority (let's say 60%) voted for Kerry and 40% voted for Bush. None of that 40% goes towards the electoral votes.  It's all Kerry.\n\nNow they say that the electoral college (electoral votes) was first created because back in the late 18th Century, people weren't educated very well.  They wanted some sort of buffer, so they created the electoral vote, which was essentially where the voters could vote AGAINST the population's vote, if they felt it necessary.  Just so you know, they can still do this.  \n\nIt creates a huge problem today.  Al Gore actually won the populous vote, but not the electoral vote...pretty unbelievable that the president that was voted in by a majority wasn't actually placed into office, huh?\n\nThe problems that it causes is that presidential candidates focus their attention in a non-pleasing/non-ethical way.  Instead of spreading themselves around, they specifically target those countries with high electoral votes.  Of course you can argue that no matter what they are going to target bigger states, but I think that eliminating the formalness of it all will encourage candidates to venture off to states not normally visited.\n\nAs you can tell, I'm a big supporter of eliminating the electoral vote.  I think that most people are wise enough to vote in a sufficient way; after all, at least they have a high school background (most anyways).  It's outdated for our times and I for one think it should be removed.
978551
The obvious answer is the candidate who gets the most votes.  I know someone will answer that by saying that didn't happen in the 2000 Presidential Election, but that election is settled by who gets the most Electoral College votes and not by a majority vote.  Regardless whom ever gets elected will find themselves subject to pressure from their party, the outside lobbyist ect to the point that by the time the next election comes they will find themselves to have sold their soles to the one who has the money and not to the electorate that voted them in to office.
210265
My solution to the Electoral College would be split up the states vote by Congressional House of Rep. districts. and then divide each states populous vote by district. To where a candidate could loose a state but still get an electoral college vote accordance with the percentage of the populous vote of that state.
913110
The Constitution mandates that the President and Vice President be chosen by Electors (members of the Electoral College). Only the Electoral college vote is used determine who becomes President. There is actually no national popular vote as far as the Constitution is concerned. See Article II and the 12th Amendment. \n\nThe Electors are chosen by the citizens of the states, according to laws established by the states. So, each state determines the formula for how the popular state vote is converted to an electoral vote, and then directs the state's Electors to vote that way.\n\nMost states allocate Electoral votes all-or-nothing, based on which candidate gets the highest number of votes in the state. So, if a candidate gets 51% of the popular votes in a state, that candidate gets 100% of the Electoral votes for that state.\n\nThe problem with the Electoral college is two-fold. First, it results in situations where a person loses the national popular vote, but because of the way the formula is applied ends up getting a majority of Electoral votes.\n\nThe other problem is that the all-or-nothing system effectively locks us into a two-party system, since a candidate must get the majority of votes in a state before ANY of the Electoral votes count. So, in a three-way race, someone could easily get 2/3 of the national popular vote, yet still fall below the threshold in every single state and thus end up with NO electoral votes at all.
738918
Remember, the Electoral College is ONLY for presidential elections.  We have "direct" elections of all other electable federal offices now.\nStates are assigned electoral votes by adding the number of members is has in the U.S. House of Representatives + its number of Senators (2).  The "electors" themselves are chosen by a candidate's political party.  They are usually people who have been in the party for a long time, or teachers (civics lessons for their kids) or such people.  \nOn election day, when you vote for U.S. President, you're actually voting for the electors who have pledged to cast their ballot for that individual.  It's a winner-take-all system in all but two states, so the candidate who has the most votes gets the entire slate of electors from that state.\nA few weeks later, the electors of that state gather at their state capitols and cast their ballots.  Although they have pledged to vote for a candidate, they are not bound by federal law to do so; and there have been "faithless" electors who have changed their votes (although none affecting elections in "modern times")\nThen, the votes are gathered and sent to the President of the Senate for tabulation.  The votes are counted, and a new president and vice-president are named.\nhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Electoral_College
922672
The electoral college works by giving each state a certain number of votes for president.  Big states like California and New York have more votes than states with fewer people, like Iowa and Montana.\n\nYou need to look at the numbers of votes each state has.  Then look at which states Bush and Kerry won.  When you add up the votes from the different states, Bush had more total votes than Kerry.\n\nTo answer your questions, you need to figure out three different combinations of states that would have still made Bush won, and three different combinations of states that would have made Kerry win.
352742
it is by the number of electoral college votes.  these are based on the populations of the states the larger the state the larger the number (ie cali and florida are big montana is low) it is not by majority vote or popular vote as some call it.