and a Christian spirit; let us neglect all party [loyalty] and advert to facts; let us believe no man to be infallible or impeccable in government any more than in religion; take no man’s word against evidence, nor implicitly adopt the sentiments of others who may be deceived themselves, or may be interested in deceiving us. To hear our Founding Fathers speak of liberty and freedom you might believe that they had some knowledge and experience with the subject matter. When the impeachment process was first raised at the 1787 convention in Philadelphia, it led to a furious argument among the delegates. George Washington (Lansdowne Portrait) by Gilbert Stuart, oil on canvas, 1796. This has led some to question why Americans use this system to elect their presidents in the first place. 1 decade ago. After all, the fledgling nation had just fought its way out from under a tyrannical king and overreaching colonial governors. November 01, 2020 Click here to get involved! The Papers of George Washington. By NANCY BENAC December 15, 2016 GMT. Citizens concerned for the future of their country, under a federal government that's increasingly bloated, corrupt, reckless and invasive, have a constitutional option. The Founding Fathers often viewed their new government as an experiment, but this was an experiment they desperately wanted to succeed. Vote for the candidates who represent your values and become the statesman that John Adams wanted all Americans to be. Wow! These are our favorite Founders quotes on government as a necessary evil. So why does the Electoral College still exist, despite its contentious origins and awkward fit with modern politics? duty to vote, founding fathers of america, religious freedom, threats to religious freedom Keep this news available to you and millions more Your gift will spread truth, defeat lies, and save lives Among the many thorny questions debated by the delegates to the 1787 Constitutional Convention, one of the hardest to resolve was how to elect the president. What day did the Second Continental Congress vote for independence? Click here to find out where to vote on Election Day. Founding Fathers distrusted popular vote to pick a president. Which Founding Father Are You? This is the preferred way to select the chief executive, period,’” says Edwards. Further complicating the task was a deep-rooted distrust of executive power. While the federal government is in need of several long-term reforms to limit its power and balance its checkbook, the overall system our Founders designed has allowed our country to become prosperous, law-abiding, and free. So you know where I am going with this. Twice a week we compile our most fascinating features and deliver them straight to you. by You also think women should never, ever have the ability to vote and, more than likely, owned slaves. WASHINGTON (AP) — It’s time for America to get up to speed again on the Electoral College, that oddball way the nation selects its president every four years. They didn’t want another despot on their hands. You're all of them! Who, in your opinion, would the Founding Fathers vote for in the presidential election of 2008? Now, it may seem counterintuitive that our founding fathers were worried about entrusting power to voters because, after all, it was our founding fathers who created this great democracy of the United States. Treasure Hunts Word Finds Dates To Remember Glossary of Terms. If the presidential election was today, and the founding fathers were the candidates, which one would you vote for? Our country must find a way to move beyond the hatred and divisiveness that pervades our political system. It certainly would have driven Virginia’s Founding Fathers nuts. Click here to find out where to vote on Election Day. Instead, the states would each appoint independent “electors” who would cast the actual ballots for the presidency. Any semblance of elector independence has been fully wiped out. One group of delegates felt strongly that Congress shouldn’t have anything to do with picking the president. Everyone, regardless of party or political thought, should be … That's why we're encouraging all of our supporters to get out and vote. “If all 68,838,219 popular votes had been poured into a single national bucket, there would have been powerful incentives to challenge the results in many of the nation’s 170,000 precincts.”, READ MORE: Presidents Who Lost the Popular Vote But Won the Election. But as soon as national political parties formed, the number of presidential candidates shrank. READ MORE: 8 Founding Fathers and How They Helped Shape the Nation. The Founding Fathers were, of course, concerned with the will of the people, but taken as a whole, the debate underway today seems to hold very little resemblance to … Quotes from the Founding Fathers: On the importance of Voting – Check your registration or register to Vote John Adams. We electors have an important constitutional power placed in our hands; we have a check upon two branches of the legislature . Let us examine, then, with a sober, a manly . Where differences arose, the Founding Fathers hammered out compromises, working together for more than four months to “form a more perfect union,” as described in the preamble to the Constitution. Kevin Beckman. Convention Of States. Their compromise is known as the Electoral College. Roger Sherman and Oliver Ellsworth in 1787 drafting The Great Compromise, a plan for representation in Congress. We respect your privacy, but we don't want you to feel left out! Take this fun and interactive 15 question "Which Founding Father Would You Vote For?" Here's the pitch. “John F. Kennedy’s popular vote margin over Richard M. Nixon was just 118,574,” writes Will. The system calls for the creation, every four years, of a temporary group of electors equal to the total number of representatives in Congress. The drafters of the Constitution assumed that electors would vote according to their individual discretion, not the dictates of a state or national party. It was the same issue that plagued the distribution of seats in the House of Representatives: should or shouldn’t the Founders include slaves in counting a state’s population? For 32 of the United States’ first 36 years, a slave-holding Virginian occupied the White House (John Adams from Massachusetts was the exception). . . Tomorrow our nation will choose our president, dozens of federal representatives, and hundreds of state and local officials. That was the wind up. If it was, ten year olds could vote. Did you know? The signing of the Constitution of the United States at the Constitutional Convention of 1787. According to the Constitution, if no single candidate wins a majority of the electoral votes, the decision goes to the House, where each state gets one vote. Out of those drawn-out debates came a compromise based on the idea of electoral intermediaries. Download Your Free Convention of States Pocket Guide Today! READ MORE: How Are Electoral College Electors Chosen? Please enable cookies to ensure you get the best experience on our website, Published in Today, most electors are bound to vote for their party’s candidate. Article I • Article II • Article III • Article IV • Article V • Article VI • Article VII . I mean really, with the federal government completely ignoring the 9th and 10th amendment they might just revolt. . Vote for the candidates who represent your values and become the statesman that John Adams wanted all Americans to be. I think that may be an easy one to answer. And even more important, the Constitution says nothing about how the states should allot their electoral votes. Not only was the creation of the Electoral College in part a political workaround for the persistence of slavery in the United States, but almost none of the Founding Fathers’ assumptions about the electoral system proved true. The founding fathers of the United States possessed a great fear: Voters going berserk and electing a whack-O candidate for president. Patrick Henry was a radical revolutionary who was unafraid to speak up against Great … 1 3. We have received a rich inheritance from previous generations, men and women who protected our constitutional republic and gave us the ability to make our voices heard. You're all of the founding fathers. "One of … All Rights Reserved. In modern elections, the first candidate to get 270 of the 538 total electoral votes wins the White House. John Jay pointed out that American were unique in the world in our ability to choose our own leaders: The Americans are the first people whom Heaven has favored with an opportunity of deliberating upon and choosing the forms of government under which they should live. The considerable investment of Southern Founders in slave-based staple agriculture, … This is why the Constitution is filled with a number of measures that prevent majoritarian rule of democracy. The party in power typically benefits from the existence of the Electoral College, says Edwards, and the minority party has little chance of changing the system because a constitutional amendment requires a two-thirds supermajority in Congress plus ratification by three-fourths of the states. The Founding Fathers had to compromise when it came to devising a system to elect the president. Which Virginian founding father first gained attention after the case "Parsons Cause" and later went on the be an influential figure in the fight against the stamp act and in the Boston Tea party? The Founding fathers have been hammered by liberals for years that they were racists and discriminated against others in a variety of issues. The Founding Fathers debated for months, with some arguing that Congress should pick the president and others insistent on a democratic popular vote… We electors have an important constitutional power placed in our hands; we have a check upon two branches of the legislature . Founding Fathers, the most prominent statesmen of America’s Revolutionary generation, responsible for the successful war for colonial independence from Great Britain, the liberal ideas celebrated in the Declaration of Independence, and the republican form of government defined in … Presidents Who Lost the Popular Vote But Won the Election. First, they thought 18th-century voters lacked the resources to be fully informed about the candidates, especially in rural outposts. Five times in history, presidential candidates have won the popular vote but lost the Electoral College. I realize that this is an impossible question to answer. For starters, there were no political parties in 1787. READ MORE: How the Great Compromise Affects Politics Today. only one of them are founding fathers and i think they would vote as they see fit, seeing as they believed in what George Washington believed in no political parties. Too much opportunity for chummy corruption between the executive and legislative branches. Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY, left) shakes hands with Senator Bob Bennett (R-UT) after the electoral votes from the 2008 presidential elections were counted and certified in the House Chamber in the U.S. Capitol January 8, 2009. Echoing John Adams' sentiment, Samuel Adams called voting "one of the most solemn trusts in human society for which he is accountable to God and his country.". . Treasure Hunts Word Finds Dates To Remember Glossary of Terms. You have the foresight of Jefferson, the leadership of Washington, and the vision of Benjamin Franklin. 0 0. . . The result was the controversial “three-fifths compromise,” in which enslaved Black people would be counted as three-fifths of a person for the purpose of allocating representatives and electors and calculating federal taxes. the power I mean of electing at stated periods [each] branch. The Founders, in short, believed that American citizens have a duty to vote with thoughtfulness and intentionality. Libertarian or Ron Paul. Almost every time I give this talk, someone wants to know what the Founding Fathers would find most surprising about today’s America. I hope that he will learn that supporting our nation and democracy comes way before political party loyalty. Powered by the principles laid out in our Constitution, We the People have the right to have our voices heard and decide who will represent us. Plus the old-school electoral system has its benefits. Only two U.S. elections have been decided by the House and the last one was in 1824. . In 1787, roughly 40 percent of people living in the Southern states were enslaved Black people, who couldn’t vote. People should qualify to vote. The Founding Fathers knew that as the nation grew and the time required for debating and voting on every issue increased, the public’s desire to take part in the process would quickly decrease. The compromise ensured that Southern states would ratify the Constitution and gave Virginia, home to more than 200,000 slaves, a quarter (12) of the total electoral votes required to win the presidency (46). Technically, it is these electors, and not the American people, who vote for the president. With the Electoral College, for example, there’s no chance of a run-off election or a protracted national recount. These intermediaries wouldn’t be picked by Congress or elected by the people. Elections Lin-Manuel Miranda Midterm Elections Hamilton Founding Fathers Of The United States Today is National Voter Registration Day! It becomes necessary to every [citizen] then, to be in some degree a statesman, and to examine and judge for himself of the tendency of political principles and measures. But what did the Founders have to say about voting? We can call a... Are you sure you don't want emailed updates on our progress and local events? The Constitution of the United States. After the unanimous election of George Washington as the nation’s first president, the Founders figured that consequent elections would feature tons of candidates who would divide up the electoral pie into tiny chunks, giving Congress a chance to pick the winner. Click here to find out where to vote on Election Day. The Founding Fathers of the United States, or simply the Founding Fathers or Founders, were a group of American leaders who united the Thirteen Colonies, led the war for independence from Great Britain, and built a frame of government for the new United States of America upon republican principles during the latter decades of the 18th century.. HISTORY reviews and updates its content regularly to ensure it is complete and accurate. We made it easy for you to exercise your right to vote! U.S. history quiz to find out! July 2, 1776. How did they recommend the American people choose their representatives? . And third, a populist president appealing directly to the people could command dangerous amounts of power. Columnist George Will shudders to think of what would have happened in the 1960 election if there had been no Electoral College. The Founders also assumed that most elections would ultimately be decided by neither the people nor the electors, but by the House of Representatives. Which Founding Father Would You Vote For? But if you see something that doesn't look right, click here to contact us! The limitations that the Founding Fathers placed on "one man, one vote" were almost all designed to bias the electorate towards men of education, knowledge, social responsibility. Libraries are more important in … “It wasn’t like the Founders said, ‘Hey, what a great idea! They spoke and wrote openly of their concerns about what it would take to keep liberty strong, how liberty could be … It's our obligation to use that inheritance wisely and pass it on to future generations. 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