Distorting Democracy The Forgotten History of the Electoral College—and Why It Matters Today

The complicated history of how America elects presidents and why this matters to the next election An engaging mix of history and political science, Distorting Democracy will awaken Americans to the perils of our system by unveiling the Electoral College’s origins, history, and current problems. This book demonstrates that the system has no principled foundation, that it has changed dramatically over its 230–year history, and that it now threatens the legitimacy of our political system. Part I tells the story of the Electoral College’s origins in the Constitutional Convention. Defenders of the Electoral College tend to invoke gauzy images of the Founding Fathers infusing our system with their unique, timeless wisdom. But history tells a very different story. The Founding Fathers faced a mess; they responded by creating a mess. Part II traces two hundred years of innovations—many of them subtle but highly consequential—to the plan described in the Constitution.