Why are electors so important?

Answer 1

Some reasons why it is considered beneficial:

It contributes to the cohesiveness of the country by requiring a distribution of popular support to be elected president.

It enhances the status of minority interests.

It contributes to the political stability of the nation by encouraging a two-party system.

It maintains a federal system of government and representation.

However, one of the college's initial benefits has been lost through the expansion and concentration of the US population (and of the elector distribution): it no longer affords an advantage to smaller states, which are marginalized because they cannot influence the outcome of the election.

Additionally, while a two-party system benefits from the electoral college, the country as a whole does not directly benefit from the two-party system. Some political party platforms seem designed more to court certain voters than to properly run the country.

Answer 2

It is not very democratic in my opinion, but it is important because in a nutshell...

The people of the US vote for representatives for each of the states in the country..
These representatives are free to cast their own vote based on opinion, but usually favor one particular party.

The citizen vote is what's called the "popular" vote.
The electoral college vote is what matters, because the citizens elected the electoral college member to vote for them.

Example: 130-119 of the popular vote
Example: 27-28 of the electoral votes

Since the party with the 28 electoral votes was 1 higher, even though they lost in the citizen(popularity) vote.. they won the election based on the electoral college.

The only reason in theory that this works is because electoral college voting members are based on population within a state to how many a state is provided.

This allows for a state such as Rhode Island to still be granted some importance compared to a state as large as Florida.

Answer 3

Electoral votes in the U.S. Electoral College determine the President and Vice President of the United States. Every state and the District of Columbia are awarded a certain number of electoral votes with which to elect the President. Each state has electoral votes equal to the total of the 2 representative the state has in the U.S. Senate plus the number of representative the state has in the House of Representatives. Since every state has two senators and at least one representative to the House, every state has at least 3 electoral votes. The District of Columbia gets 3 electoral votes. Therefore, the total number of electoral votes is 538 - 100 (senators) + 435 (representatives) + 3 (for DC). A majority is 270 - one more than half of the total number of 538.

Answer 4

Electoral votes in the U.S. Electoral College determine the President and Vice President of the United States.