Electoral College serves a purpose

Calls for scrapping the Electoral College or making an end run around it via the Electoral College compact are ill advised (“One person, one vote,” Nov. 14). The Sun states that “the biggest reason to ditch the Electoral College is that it violates the principle that each American voter should have an equal say in deciding who is president” and “the smallest states have disproportionate influence over the outcome.” Just three deep blue states — California, New York and Illinois that always vote Democratic — account for 104 Electoral College votes, 38 percent of the 270 needed to elect the president and vice-president. Talk about a “disproportionate influence.”

America is not a pure democracy. It is a republic comprised of 50 sovereign states. Pure democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. If America were a monolithic federal state, there would be no need for the Electoral College. But it is not! Only four times in U.S. history has the winner of the Electoral College not also won the popular vote. Because we are a nation of 50 sovereign states, it is appropriate that the electors of each state cast their votes for the candidate who received the majority vote in their state. No state should willingly cede a portion of its sovereignty by overruling the will of the majority of its voters and assigning the state’s Electoral College votes based on the popular vote of other states.