How big of a vote gap would it take for you to drop the Electoral College?

[BmorePat87]

further findings:

earlier in the book they mention a lot of support for a popular election, though many feared voters would not be smart enough and would just pick whoever they knew from their state. So a lot of their concern with big states was centered on this idea. It goes on to state that they believed state legislatures would control most of the selection of delegates and would ultimately be picking the President.

Also here's a timeline of delegate voting:

1. against electors and for congress electing
2. A week later they vote to take that back
3. vote against governors electing
4. vote for state legislatures electing

one month passes. 5-10 happens over a week:
5. Vote against direct election and for Congress electing.
6. vote for electors and for state legislatures picking them
7. vote to reconsider electors
8. Vote for Congress electing
9. vote against congress electing
10. vote for congress electing

A week and a half passes
11. Another committee reports favorably for congress electing
3 weeks pass
12. reject dropping Congress for direct eelction
13. can't agree to add electors
another week passes
14. can't decide, create new committee to decide
another week passes
15. new committee agrees that electors will be picked by state legislatures
16. new committee also agrees that ties will be decided in the house by 1 vote per state
17. EC approved



The book also quotes one historian as noting that the EC "was cobbled together nearly at the last minute and adopted not because the framers believed it would work, but because it was less objectionable than two more obvius alternatives... it had no positive advantages of its own"

another notes that it "was merey a jerry rigged improvisation which has subsequently been endowed with a high theoretical content", which seems to match the influx of justifications for the EC which are not rooted in any of the actual debates at the convention.

He also quotes Madison as saying that small states do not need protection from large states as the large states were diverse in location, economy, and religion, suggesting they were more likely to be rivals than form a coalition against small states.