How does the winner take all feature of the electoral college hinder the third party?

Answer 1

It is a fact of life that the vast majority of voters either belong to one or the other political party or are independent but still vote for a major party candidate. One or the other major party will win a state's election with the other coming in second. The best a third party can realistically hope for is to come in second, which means it still gets none of that state's electoral votes. If a state's electoral votes were distributed according to the percentage of the popular it got in the election, it would get some electoral votes, but still not enough to make a difference in the election.

Answer 2

A candidate is required to receive at least 270 electoral votes. Even if a third party got a plurality, the chances of receiving the entire 270 when there are three parties running is small. Having three or more viable candidates increases the likelihood of an election decided by Congress instead.

In the past, the greatest effect of a third-party candidate was to badly weaken one of the two major parties and lead to the win of the other party.

Answer 3

The third party runners usually get substantially less votes than the other two parties, therefore when they lose, they lose by a landslide because their votes are then shifted to the winners. They basically stand no chance unless they get the majority of the votes.

More importantly, third-party candidates seldom have enough support to win a simple majority in any state. However, they can often pull a substantial portion of the entire public vote. Thus, it is common to see that a 3rd-party candidate may pull 25% or more of the vote, but get NO electoral college electors.

Under a systems such as the Congressional District Method (where the requirement to win is simply a majority in a single Congressional district), it would be entirely possible for a 3rd-party candidate to win 10-15% of the Electors (assuming a 25% popular vote). In a close race, this could be the difference - if neither major party could get 50% of the Electors (which is quite possible), then the 3rd-party candidate would have substantial influence when the Electoral College met.

As of right now, there is really no hope for a 3rd-party candidate to win, and generally speaking, they can only play the role of "spoiler".

Answer 4

There are two main effects:

1) Candidates do not waste time or money campaigning in states in which they think they have no chance of winning a majority of the state's votes (hence losing all of those electoral votes to another candidate).

2) Candidates spend more time and money in those large-population states (swing states) where they have an opportunity to eke out a majority, no matter how small, and thereby win the state. This means that large amounts of money are used on a very small proportion of the populace, which increases the likelihood of corruption or election misbehavior in those regions.

Answer 5

The way is set up right now, yes. The majority percent vote in a state, even if it's 51%, will give 100% of the electoral votes of that state to that political party's candidate. Some people see this as the right way to distribute electoral votes because it's the way it's been done for hundreds of years. Other argue that the system is obsolete and needs to be reformed to better fit the diversity of the 21st century.

My opinion: many have supported a constitutional bill that would reform the allocation of electoral votes depending upon the percentage of the electoral votes. For example if state X's popular vote is 20% Democrat and 80% Republican, and state X has a total of 10 electoral votes, that would mean that 2 votes would go to the democratic parry and 8 would go to the republican candidate. That instead of how it's set up now; today that republican candidate would get all 10 electoral votes from state X and the democrat candidate would get ZERO.

Many argue that it's necessary to reform the system and the allocation of electoral votes because:

1) it would appropriately represent the majority AND the minority

2) motivate more citizens to vote, specially young ones, because they would feel confident that even if they are the minority they are still being represented.

3) it would motivate the presidential candidates to be more vigilant in his or her campaign strategy because they would be forced to not just campaign not just in swing states like Ohio or Iowa. (no presidential candidate has ever won the presidency without having won Ohio) but they would also have to campaign in other states listening to the needs of everyone not just the tie breakers.

4) it also necessary to fix a hidden loop whole that many disregard and that's the controversial debate between state and federal rights. In the rare case in which a state, like Ohio, is divided evenly at 50% D and 50% R, under the way it's set up now it would be up to the State's legislature to decide to decide which candidate will get the electoral votes. This leaves a TON of power in a select few. These select few could potentially make or break a NATIONAL election, not a State's election. Therefor it would inappropriate for a single State's unicameral legislature to decide the fate of the whole nation. Under the new amendment the votes would clearly be divided in half and allocated 'fairly'.

5) many feel it's important that even if they are a minority in a state that his or her vote is contributing to his or her candidate towered his or her winning of the presidency.

REMEMBER, This is only my point of view and my arguments, if you find other reasons for why to keep the system the same, please feel free to argue your points.

The beautiful thing about america is that you have the liberty to argue your points without being harassed, so please be polite and professional and we will listen.

Answer 6

Having three strong candidates increases the chances that nobody receives the votes of more than half of the electors, leaving the choice of president up to the U.S. House of Representatives and the choice of vice president up to the U.S. Senate.