Introduction
Though initially convened to fix the Articles of Confederation in 1787, the
Constitutional Convention ended up creating an entirely new style of government under
the Constitution. One of the items on the agenda was to devise how to elect the
president, and after different proposals and amendments were brought to the table and
voted on, the Electoral College of 1787 was born. Two hundred forty-four years and
forty-six presidents later, the Electoral College still stands as the method by which the
American president is selected. The Electoral College serves as an indirect method of
voting, as the people vote for a group of electors who go on to vote for president, rather
than voting for the president directly. While it was amended in 1803 (the Twelfth
Amendment) and 1960 (the Twenty-Third Amendment) and states have made their own
changes as time has gone on, the system has largely stayed the same. The biggest
change since the Jeffersonians passed and ratified the Twelfth Amendment was the
move away from majority rule (when a candidate for office receives more than 50.00%
of the vote) to plurality winner- take-all (when a presidential candidate wins 50.00% or
less of the vote in a state and receives 100% of electoral votes offered by that state).The
debate over reforming or abolishing the Electoral College resurfaced with the 2000 and
2016 presidential elections, as the winner of the popular vote lost the electoral vote and
thus the presidency.
The Electoral College system has largely stayed the same since its inception. U.S.
Const. art. II, §1, cl. 2-4 lays out how the original version of the Electoral College
functioned. Under the original system, each state would appoint their allotted electors
under whatever system they choose, with each state’s allotment being equal to the
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number of U.S. Senators and U.S. Representatives they had in Congress (meaning every
state had at minimum three electors). Some states utilized legislative appointments,
others direct election, others used hybrid models. On whichever day of the year that
Congress determined, the electors for each state would assemble in their states and would
cast their vote for president, with only one Constitutional requirement: one of their two
votes had to go to someone that was not from the same state as themselves. So, an elector
in Pennsylvania was constitutionally required to vote for someone who was not from
Pennsylvania. Each state was to certify and seal their electors’ votes and transmit their
official votes to the President of the Senate, who would count the electoral votes in the
presence of the U.S. Senate and U.S. House of Representatives, and whomever won the
majority of electoral votes would become president. If no candidate received the majority
of votes, the U.S. House would vote for president, and the winner would have to win the
majority of state delegations. Whomever came in second in the House or among electors
would become vice president.
The states also decide how to allocate their electoral votes. Forty-eight states
plus Washington, D.C. use a plurality winner-take-all model, while two states use a
congressional district model. Under the plurality winner-take-all model, as defined
earlier, a presidential candidate receives all of the electoral votes from a state without
winning an absolute majority (50.01%) of the vote. For example, if a hypothetical
Democratic nominee won 47.46% of the vote and a hypothetical Republican nominee
won 48.18% of vote in Pennsylvania, despite the margin being so close (less than one
point different), the Republican nominee would win all twenty electoral votes. Maine
and Nebraska allocate their electoral votes by congressional districts and statewide

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popular vote rather than utilizing the plurality winner-take-all method. Under this
model, the candidate who wins the popular vote in each congressional district wins one
electoral vote, and then whichever candidate wins the statewide popular vote receives
the final two electoral votes. For example, a Democrat and a Republican both won one
congressional district in the state of Maine, so they received one electoral vote each. The
Democrat, however, won the statewide popular vote so they received the last two
electoral votes, resulting in the Democrat receiving three votes and the Republican
receiving one vote.
While this system has largely worked throughout American history, there are a
handful of elections where issues arose surrounding who won versus who allegedly
should have won. In 1800, Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr, both DemocraticRepublicans, tied with seventy-three electoral votes, meaning the U.S. House for the
first time had to vote for president. They ran into another problem here: votes for
president were recorded over thirty times before Jefferson eventually won the requisite
nine states to become president (Schropp 2010). This chaotic election set the stage for
the passage and ratification of the Twelfth Amendment, creating the Electoral College
of 1803, which still stands today. Under the newly ratified amendment, the vote for
president and vice president were separate, and thus candidates would run as a ticket for
president and vice president rather than separately as presidential candidates. At the
state level, electors had to be elected by majority vote, whether by direct election by the
people or by the legislature. The Jeffersonians believed that in order to receive a
mandate, a president had to win a compound majority-of-majorities. The idea was that
they would win the majority of the popular vote in the majority of the states to win the

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majority of electoral votes, and only then would a president actually have a mandate in
office. They also believed that electors needed to win majority support, whether it be
from legislative appointment or direct election, in order to be an elector for their state.
To accomplish this, states had run-off procedures to ensure that all electors had majority
support. For example, New Hampshire in the very first election had their electors
chosen by statewide popular vote. This frequently meant that candidates did not receive
majority support. To ensure electors had majority support, the legislature received the
names of the top two vote getters and chose between them, ensuring that their electors
received majority support (Foley 2020).
The presidential election of 1824 was the first election in which the popular vote
was counted, and it happens to be the next time the electoral system broke down. In
1824, Andrew Jackson received more popular votes and electoral votes than did rivals
John Quincy Adams, William Crawford, and Henry Clay. Jackson, however, did not
receive enough electoral votes to win the White House, thus resulting in a run-off in the
U.S. House between himself and Adams, as only the top two contenders are passed
along to be voted on by the House. In the runoff, John Quincy Adams won and thus
became president (Ratcliffe 2014). This sparked backlash from Jackson himself, who
subsequently launched a four-year campaign for president for the 1828 election, and
amongst his supporters. In the years leading up to the next presidential election, states
began changing the rules for appointing electors, making it so electors only had to win a
plurality of the votes. In a plurality, a candidate wins the most votes but fails to win the
majority of votes (they receive 50.00% or less of the vote). In 1828, Jackson coasted to
victory over incumbent President Adams, winning 178 electoral votes.

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There were four more elections where the system broke down in some way. In
1876, Republican Rutherford B. Hayes faced off against Democrat Samuel Tilden.
While Tilden won the popular vote and was winning in the electoral vote, the votes in
three southern states (Florida, Louisiana, and South Carolina) were being challenged
and thus, their electoral votes had not been awarded, leaving Tilden one vote shy of
winning the electoral vote. With the Compromise of 1877, the remaining votes were
awarded to Hayes, and thus he won the White House despite losing the popular vote
(Issacharoff 2005). The presidential elections in 1888, 2000, and 2016 all turn out in
similar fashions (though the election in 2000 required the intervention of the U.S.
Supreme Court in the case Bush v. Gore). In all three, the winner of the popular vote
lost the electoral vote, albeit by varying margins, with Democrat Hillary Clinton’s
popular vote margin of victory being the largest in American history (Weinschenk and
Panagopoulos 2018). Each electoral problem in some way sparked and added to the
debate over whether or not the United States should continue with the Electoral College,
whether it should be abolished, or whether it should be reformed. The Electoral College
has also been discussed as being a possible reason for the United States lagging behind
other western democracies in terms of voter turnout.
Voter turnout in American elections is another problem being studied by
political scientists. While participation is slightly higher in presidential elections than in
midterm elections, the U.S. still has low turnout relative to international standards. In
2016, only 55.72% of age-eligible (population above the legal voting age) Americans
cast a ballot, compared to 88.02% in Sweden in 2018 and 69.11% in Germany in 2017
(DeSilver 2020). In the 1960 presidential election, turnout was approximately 64%, the

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highest to that point since 1900 (Nardulli, Dalager, and Greco, 1996). The voter turnout
problem will be discussed further in the literature review section.
In this paper, I will explore different proposals for reforming and abolishing the
Electoral College. Utilizing survey research, I will look at how the 2020 election result
would have been different under these proposed reforms. Finally, I will also explore the
issue of voter turnout in American presidential elections and utilizing a survey, see if
electoral reform would have any effect on voter turnout. I hypothesize that the 2020
election outcome would not differ under alternative election systems. I also hypothesize
that electoral reform would increase voter turnout and that respondents would prefer the
national popular vote.
Literature Review
The literature discussing the Electoral College and the debate over the method
used to elect the president all seems to rest on the same overall argument: that the
winner should reflect the will of the voters and states. While the overall argument
typically revolves around this idea, there tends to be three sides in the debate. The first
side argues that the United States should stay with the Electoral College as it operates
today with no changes/reforms. The second side argues that the United States should
abolish the Electoral College altogether and implement a national popular vote system.
Though not a part of the main debate, the third side argues in favor of maintaining the
Electoral College but reforming it and changing how electoral votes are awarded to
candidates in presidential contests. Proposed reforms to the current system include
implementing a national popular vote, utilizing proportional allocation of electoral
votes, implementing the congressional district model nationwide, ranked choice voting,
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approval voting, and range (score) voting.
These debates over the future of the Electoral College have raged for decades and
the Electoral College has been the subject of more proposed amendments than any other
provision of the U.S. Constitution (Richie and Levien 2013; Drake 2013). As mentioned
previously, it was successfully amended twice (the Twelfth and Twenty-Third
Amendments), however the changes that have been seen have largely been at the state
level. While not perfect, the Electoral College has its advantages and disadvantages.
When discussing electoral reforms and models, Turner (2005) argues that any
presidential election system should encourage broad electoral coalitions, stimulate citizen
interest and turnout, produce a president who can govern, strengthen the two- party
system, discourage fraud and be relatively neutral. The first side of the debate argues in
favor of maintaining the Electoral College model that is currently used. Under this
system, the winner of the popular vote in each state gets all of the electoral votes up for
grabs (with the exception of Maine and Nebraska). Some scholars have found that support
for this method of presidential election is more fluid than people generally believe it to
be. Utilizing Bush and Kerry voters, Aldrich, Reifler, and Munger (2014) found that
voters support for the current “winner-take-all” Electoral College method is strongest
when they feel that their preferred candidate will win their state. Support for reform,
specifically for the proportional method, rises when they feel that a different candidate is
going to win their state. They found that four variables influenced voters’ support for the
status quo or reform as (1) which candidate one supports, (2) which candidate they think
will win the election under the current apportionment model, (3) preferences for
abolishing the Electoral College in favor of the popular vote winter, and (4) statistical

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interactions between these variables.
Cain, Basciano, and Cain (2007) argued that being that the goal of eliminating
the Electoral College is to ensure the winner more accurately reflects the will of the
voters, abolishing the status quo is contrary to that goal. Their research found that
eliminating the current Electoral College model risks having an incorrect result and that
the Electoral College is a safeguard to prevent that incorrect result from occurring.
They also found that the modern Electoral College offers some advantages that a direct
popular vote methodology would not.
According to Pavia (2011), supporters of the current Electoral College focus their
support on seven ideas, (1) it requires a distribution of popular support to be president,
(2) maintains the federal character of the country and separation of powers, (3)
maintains stability by encouraging the two-party system, (4) enhances the status and
integration into the system of minority groups, (5) isolates election problems, (6) reduces
turnout disparities among states, and (7) prevents heavy concentrations of power in
larger states.
The second side of the debate fights in favor of abolishing the Electoral College
and establishing a national popular vote system of voting for president, meaning that
whichever candidate wins the most votes nationwide would win the presidential
election. This side argues that the Electoral College produces results that are not
representative of the will of voters and of the people. Karp and Tolbert (2010) argue that
support for reforming presidential elections is shaped by both long and short-term
forces. They claim that those on the side that lost are more likely to change their opinion
on reform and favor a change in the status quo. They also argue that when it comes to

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reform, people are more likely to support electoral reform when they live in smallpopulation states that feel unimportant in the electoral cycle and outcome. People are
more likely to oppose reform when they live in a larger-population state that feels
important in electoral cycles and outcomes, however, they are more open to reform if
their state is later in the nominating process. They also predict that voters that live in
highly influential states (determined by timing of primary or battleground status) would
be less supportive of reform because they would stand to lose electoral influence and
give smaller, less influential states more influence and power in the electoral process.
Florey (2017) argues that there are three mechanisms, (1) the two-vote bonus,
(2) population-based allocation, and (3) winner-take-all award of each states’ votes, that
the modern Electoral College has that gives it the ability to produce results that would
differ from a national popular vote. She argues that mechanism #3 is the least
defensible and most harmful because its introduction to the electoral system was done
at the state level as a result of partisan jockeying instead of as a result of debate and
compromise. According to Pavia (2011), opponents of the current Electoral College
focus on four main points, (1) it can elect a minority president, (2) faithless electors are
possible, (3) it could possibly depress voter turnout, and (4) it fails to reflect national
popular will. Fon (2004) also makes two observations critical to the opposition of the
current model. He observes that there may not be a consistent relationship between the
popular vote margin and the electoral vote margin, and that there might not be a
relationship between the outcome of the current Electoral College system and the
outcome of the national popular vote. Richie and Levien (2013) cite FairVote’s
attention index in opposing the Electoral College. The attention index “measures

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campaign attention relative to the average attention a state would have received if
campaigns had spent money and allocated numbers of candidate events based only on
population.” In this index, a score of 1.0 indicates that a state was treated equally
relative to population, while a score over
1.0 indicates more attention and less than 1.0 indicates less attention. They found that
only nine states had indices over 1.0, while the other forty-two states (plus Washington,
D.C.) received a score of less than 1.0.
While electoral controversies have ignited the movement pushing for a
constitutional amendment to abolish the Electoral College in favor of the popular vote,
they have also inspired a coalition of states to come together to propose an interstate
compact known as the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact (NPV). Under this
compact, the member states would award their electoral votes to whomever wins the
nationwide popular vote, regardless of which candidate wins each statewide popular
vote. The NPV is activated once enough states join that their collective electoral vote
total is the majority of electoral votes, meaning that it will be activated upon enough
states joining so that their collective total of electoral votes is equal to at minimum 270
out of 538. 270 is currently the majority of votes needed to win the presidency. Should
the number of seats in the Senate and/or House change, the number of electoral votes
required to win will also change so that it is the majority of possible electoral votes.
There is, however, debate over the constitutionality of the compact and
whether it actually could be activated once the requisite number of electoral votes is
achieved. U.S. Const. art. I, §10, cl. 3 states that “No state shall, without the consent of
Congress... enter into any agreement or compact with another state ” This clause,

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known as the Compact Clause, is used by opponents of the NPV as reason why it will
be difficult to activate without congressional approval. That being said, however,
Drake (2013), utilizing an examination of Supreme Court decisions, argues that it
would be unconstitutional for Congress to grant approval of the NPV for two reasons,
(1) the Constitution explicitly states that each state gets to decide on the manner that
will be used for selecting presidential electors and (2) because the Electoral College is
an institution created and mandated by the Constitution, Congress thus cannot sidestep
it via statutory act. His overall argument is that based on established Supreme Court
decisions, the NPV must be submitted to Congress for approval prior to
implementation, but that Congress cannot constitutionally grant approval of the
compact, leaving it unable to be implemented.
Richie and Levien (2013) present two main arguments in support of states’ ability to
enter into such a compact. Their first argument is that states get to decide how to award
their electoral votes, which the Supreme Court characterized as “exclusive and plenary”
in the 1892 McPherson v. Blacker decision. Their second argument is that states have
the constitutional right to create and engage in binding interstate compacts. They also
argue that the NPV is the best way forward for electoral reform as it should result in
every vote counting the same and the attention index would eventually be close to 1.0
for every state. The third side of the debate, which gets significantly less attention than
the first two sides, focuses on implementing new reforms to the functionality of the
Electoral College or implementing different approaches to voting for president. More
specifically, proponents on this side either want to see electoral votes allocated using a
method other than winner-take-all, or they want to see the implementation of a new

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electoral system altogether but are opposed to the national popular vote method. There
are a variety of different voting systems that have been explored by political scientists
and mathematicians and that have been proposed as possible alternatives, including the
congressional district model, proportional allocation, ranked choice voting, approval
voting, and range (score) voting.
In 1972 and 1991, respectively, Maine and Nebraska reformed how they
allocate their electoral votes. Instead of utilizing the plurality winner-take-all rules that
the other forty-eight states and the District of Columbia use, they allocate their electoral
votes based on who wins in each congressional district and who wins statewide.
Introducing this method of electoral allocation nationwide has also been a topic of
discussion. Fon (2004), using theoretical states, calculates that this system of vote
allocation has the ability to reflect voter preferences better at the state level, though if a
state has at least seven electors, the statewide winner may still lose the state electoral
vote. This phenomenon could occur because candidate A could win one congressional
district and the statewide popular vote, which would translate to three electoral votes. If
candidate B won a plurality in the other four congressional districts, that would result in
candidate B winning four electoral votes to candidate A’s three electoral votes. This
means that that under the congressional district model, it is possible for the statewide
winner to still lose the state in the final tally. Richie and Levien (2013) argue that the
Maine-Nebraska congressional district model is “indefensible” from the perspectives of
partisan balance and political equality because most districts are lopsided in favor of
one party and that this method would actually result in an increase in the number of
elections where candidates win the electoral vote while losing the national popular vote.

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Turner (2005) thoroughly examines this electoral system and looks at the
efficiency and accuracy of the system, and how this model would impact presidential
campaign strategy and the president’s ability to govern. He argues that the congressional
district model reduces the winner- take-all distortion and produces a more accurate
reflection of the preference of voters. He also notes how the district method would then
also introduce what is known as “spillover campaigning” into the system on a broader
scale. In spillover campaigning, commercials that are designed for battleground districts
also get shown in non-targeted districts as a result of media markets overlapping
congressional districts. An analysis of this phenomenon under the district system in the
2000 election was done in Texas and found that as a result of spillover campaigning
from competitive districts in Texas and New Mexico, “voters in twenty-seven of the
thirty-one districts would likely experience at least some presidential campaign
advertising.” In 2000, Texas had only four competitive districts that would have seen
significant advertising.
An additional alternative framework that has been proposed for reforming the
Electoral College is to allocate electoral votes using a proportional model, of which
there are various kinds. The first model, which is used to see how the 2020 election
outcome would differ, simply divides the number of electoral votes from each state
based on the popular vote shares in each using only whole numbers. So, for example, in
the 2016 election, Democrat Hillary Clinton won 47.46% of the vote in Pennsylvania
(which has twenty electoral votes), while Republican Donald Trump won 48.18% of the
vote (FEC 2017). Under this model, Clinton would receive 47.46% of the electoral vote
(calculates to nine electoral votes to the nearest whole number), and Trump

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would receive 48.18% of the electoral vote (calculates to ten electoral votes to the nearest
whole number). This is known as integral proportional allocation, where the slate of
electors is split roughly in proportion to the state’s popular vote with the winner of the
popular vote receiving a favorable adjustment, with the electoral count awarded to each
candidate always being a whole number (Fon 2004).
Fon (2004) proposes one other model of proportional allocation: perfect proportion.
Under perfect proportional allocation, decimals and fractions would be used to perfectly
align the electoral votes in each state based upon their percentage of the electoral vote.
This means that if a state has N electors and candidate A receives α% of the popular
vote, then the number of electoral votes awarded to candidate A is equal to α% times N,
resulting in electoral votes split down to the decimal and the electors split as many ways
as there are candidates. There are downsides to this system though, including 1) that
fractions and decimals must be acceptable and used and 2) the vote count must be
precise so states will be required to expend time and resources verifying the vote count
so the electoral votes can be split appropriately.
At the same time, he observes that this system can produce winners that are
inconsistent with the statewide popular vote and the winner under this system may still
not reflect the national popular vote winner (i.e. the national popular vote winner may
still lose the electoral vote and thus still lose the presidency). That being said, Fon also
acknowledges that under any Electoral College system model, it is possible for the
winner of the electoral vote to lose the popular vote.
There has also been a movement to adopt ranked choice voting in state and federal
races, including the race for president. In ranked choice voting, voters rank candidates in
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order of their preference. They mark their most preferred candidate with a 1, their second
most preferred candidate with a 2, and so on down the list of candidates. If one candidate
gets the majority of first place votes, that candidate wins. If no candidate reaches that
threshold, the candidate with the least first place votes is eliminated, and all of those
votes are reallocated to their second pick. This process continues until one candidate has
received the majority of votes and/or only two candidates remain. Richie (2017) argues
that ranked choice voting provides new incentives for candidates to reach out to all
voters, rather than just their base, in an effort to obtain a higher ranking. He also argues
that it can “mitigate partisan inflexibility, foster greater accountability for incumbents,
increase civic engagement, and reduce the impact of campaign spending” (Richie 2017,
20). He also discusses ranked choice voting as a realistic alternative to utilizing run-offs
due to the issues of disparate turnout in run-offs compared to the general election. He
notes that more than 96% of the 200 congressional primary run-offs since 1994
experienced declines in turnout, with the turnout decline averaging more than 30%.
Ranked choice voting acts as an instant run-off with the vote re-allocation mechanism,
thus ensuring that there are no voter turnout disparities between the general election and
the run-off. Santucci (2018) argues that ranked choice voting is likely to find positive
support when three conditions are met: (1) a spoiler is present, (2) most voters prefer the
losing, major party to its main alternative, and (3) the losing, major party knows this.
Initiatives to implement ranked choice voting sprang up in states and cities around the
country after the 2000 election, when Ralph Nader took enough votes from Al Gore (D)
to deprive him of a plurality in Florida and thus the election.

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This method of voting is proposed not only to ensure that the winning candidate
receives majority support from their constituents and accommodates an election having
more than two candidates, but also because it limits, if not totally removes, the impacts of
spoiler candidates.
According to Poundstone (2008), spoiler candidates “can take enough votes from
one of the front-runners to hand the election to his rival” (20). Elections with
spoilers tend to be highly controversial (election of 2000) and usually see one of
the major parties assisting the minor candidate. As noted by Poundstone, the
Republican Party in 2000 lent support to Ralph Nader in a bid to boost Bush and
hurt Gore, and again, the GOP tried to get him to run again in 2004 in an effort to
hurt Democratic nominee John Kerry and help Bush get re-elected.
Another form of voting that has been part of reform discussions is approval
voting. Under this method of voting, voters select as many candidates as they choose,
with each vote for each candidate carrying equal weight. In effect, they are selecting
which candidates they approve of being president, while not selecting those they wish
not to see win. Approval voting has been adopted by many issue-oriented associations,
such as the Mathematical Association of America and the Institute of Electrical and
Electronics Engineers, and has been used in the 1980s in competitive elections in
Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. Some U.S. states also attempted to pass approval
voting in statewide elections in the late 1980s, but none passed.
Brams and Fishburn (2005) present six arguments in favor of the
implementation of approval voting: (1) gives voters more flexibility, (2) helps elect the
strongest candidate, (3) reduce negative campaigning, (4) increase voter turnout, (5)

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give minority candidates their “proper due,” and (6) eminently practical. Approval
voting, according to Brams and Fishburn, would enable minority (third party or
independent) candidates to obtain their true support because voters could still vote for
them and they could vote for the major candidate that they feel best represents them, so
they can still vote for their true preference while still having a say in the outcome either
way. Smith, Quintal, and Greene (2005) argue that implementing approval voting could
result in three potential benefits: (1) immunity to clones, (2) more chance of getting a
result you like, and (3) less worrying about strategy and more about your honest
opinion. They argue that vote splitting is less likely to occur because if multiple
candidates are similar and appeal to the same group of voters, they can simply cast a
vote for each rather than having to select just one. This also gives voters a greater
chance that a candidate they prefer will win, thus further incentivizing them to vote and
vote honestly.
Nagel (2007) argues, however, that a form of approval voting was used in the
first four presidential elections and culminated in the election of 1800 debacle, where
Jefferson and Burr tied in the electoral vote and the U.S. House subsequently took
thirty-six votes to finally elect Jefferson, what he calls the “Burr Dilemma.” He presents
three scenarios that he argues undermine the potential benefits of approval voting. The
first scenario is that should voters on a large scale decide not to vote for two candidates
and only vote for one candidate, the system has broken down back into the system it
was designed and implemented to replace. The second scenario is that should voters
vote for two candidates who are similar in ideology and policy positions that were
courting the same voters, there is a real possibility that those two candidates could tie,

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throwing the election to the U.S. House as it did in 1800. The third scenario he presents
is that to avoid a tie, candidates and their followers would be tempted to defect from any
explicit or implicit agreement to share votes. This final scenario, as it did between
Jefferson and Burr in 1796 and 1800, can lead to increasing divisions and mistrusts
within the members of one party and could undermine future collaborations.
Range voting (also referred to as score voting) has also been a topic of
discussion. This system of voting works similarly to how rating a movie works: on their
ballot, the voter awards each candidate running a score on a scale of 0-5, with 5 being
the top score and 0 being the lowest. The candidate with the best average score is the
winner of the election. Smith, Quintal, and Greene (2005) argue that range voting would
provide two potential benefits: (1) more voter expressivity and (2) more voter interest,
higher turnout. According to them, with more ability to express themselves, voters will
be more interested in submitting their ballot. With more choices and more ability to
fully express themselves, voters potentially may turn out in higher numbers to vote.
They also argue that because the range voting ballot provides more information that the
current plurality ballot or an approval voting ballot would ensure that better candidates
will be elected.
Voter turnout is an issue in American politics. Turnout in elections lags behind
every other Western democracy in the world. Gerber and Green (2000) argue that
declining turnout rates are the result of the evolution of modern American campaigns.
They argue that campaigns increasingly using impersonal methods of mobilization
(telephone calls, direct mail) has resulted in voter turnout declining. They conducted an
experiment to test their hypothesis and found that canvassing in-person rather than over

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the phone or sending mail raises the probability of turnout by 8.7%, with a standard
error of 2.6. Richey (2008) examined the institutional barriers theory, using Oregon as a
case study, which states that complicated voting procedures make turnout difficult, so
less people vote. Using data from presidential elections from 1980 through 2004, and
mid-term elections from 1982-2006, he used a cross-sectional time-series (CXTS)
regression model of aggregate state-level turnout data to determine the effects of voting
by mail. Oregon adopted universal vote-by-mail in time for the 2000 presidential
election and has used it since.
The results of his test indicated a significant positive effect from voting by mail that
came out to be about 10 points of registered voters in both mid-term and presidential
elections.
Richie (2017) argues that ranked choice voting has the potential to increase voter
turnout in any election it is implemented for. Data analysis from more than 125 ranked
choice voting elections in the Bay Area found that voter turnout on average has risen
sharply from prior systems that used primaries and runoffs. Brams and Fishburn (2005)
argue that by implementing approval voting, voters will be more likely to vote because
they will be able to better express their preferences. They also believe that voters will
have an easier time voting if they are undecided between multiple candidates or feel they
are wasting their vote because they can vote for multiple candidates and are not forced
to make a single choice. Voters could feel that the system enables them to be more
honest, and that has the potential to make voting more meaningful and help increase
turnout.

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Research Methods
The literature on the Electoral College and prior research I have conducted were
consulted heavily when determining which electoral allocation reforms should be tested.
The proportional and Maine-Nebraska congressional district methods were reviewed
once again, after having previously evaluating these using the 2000, 2004, 2008, 2012,
and 2016 elections1. These were chosen because the Maine-Nebraska method is already
used in those states for presidential elections and seeing how it would work nationwide
is of interest amongst political scientists. The other methods discussed would also
account for votes cast by the minority party and third parties. Ranked choice voting is
utilized in Maine for their elections and has been proposed in Maine and other states to
be used in presidential elections. Approval and range voting, as well as ranked choice,
provide more viability to minor and third-party candidates and thus provide additional
options to voters. Approval voting is also the method used by the UN to elect the
Secretary-General.
A survey was written to gather the relevant data for the new voting systems
being tested as well as inquiring about voters’ opinions on electoral reform and turnout.
Respondents were asked to identify their age from the following options: 18-25, 26-35,
36-45, 46-55, 56-65, and 66+; they were asked to identify their sex from the following
options: male, female, and other; and they were asked to select their political party
identification from the following options: Democratic Party, Republican Party,
Libertarian Party, Green Party, Independent, Other.
The proportional method will be evaluated again for the 2020 election for this paper assuming the FEC
report is released in time.

1

20

After gathering demographic information, respondents were presented with a ballot that
had the same options as the 2020 Pennsylvania presidential election ballot: Joseph R.
Biden/Kamala D. Harris (Democratic), Donald J. Trump/Michael R. Pence
(Republican), and Jo Jorgensen/Jeremy “Spike” Cohen (Libertarian). Respondents were
asked to rank each ticket as either “Most Preferred,” “Second Preferred,” or “Least
Preferred.” They were then asked to select the presidential tickets that they would
approve of being president, with the note that they were allowed to select more than one
ticket. They then were asked to score each ticket on a scale from 0-5, with 5 being the
best score and 0 being the worst score. Respondents then were asked if changing how
we elect the president would make them more likely, less likely, or if there would be no
change in likelihood of their participation in presidential elections. The final question
asked them to select their preferred electoral model for electing the president from the
following options: Electoral College, national popular vote, proportional allocation,
congressional district model, ranked choice voting, approval voting, range (score)
voting, and other.
The traditional method of electoral vote allocation served as the control in this
experimental simulation. It operated the way the current Electoral College works, and
the results were as they were in those election years. The popular method uses the
national popular vote to award the presidency. Whichever candidate won the most votes
nationwide was elected president in this simulation. In the proportional method of
electoral vote allocation, votes were awarded based on the proportion of the vote
received by each candidate. Leftover votes that no candidate earned were not awarded to
any candidate. The congressional district model of electoral vote allocation followed the
21

model currently in use by Maine and Nebraska. Candidates received an electoral vote
each congressional district won in that state. Whichever candidate won the popular vote
in that state was awarded the final two electoral votes.

Data and Results
Figure 1. Age of participants by
percentage

Figure 2. Participants' sex by
percentage

4.40%2.90%

1.30%
18-25

17.50%

23.60%

26-35
51.50%

Female

36-45

Male

46-55

Other

56-65

14.30%

66+

75.20%

9.80%

Figure 3. Participants' political party
affiliation by percentage
12.80%

3.20%
Democratic

0%
2.90%

Republican
Libertarian

21.70%

59.40%

Green
Independent
Other

22

System

Winner

Electoral College
National Popular Vote
Proportional Allocation
Ranked Choice Voting
Range (Score) Voting
Approval Voting

Biden
Biden
Biden
Biden
Biden
Biden

Table 1. 2020 Presidential Election Results Under Alternative Voting Systems

Figure 5. Participant preferences for
alternative voting systems

Figure 4. Likelihood of participant
participation in presidential election
if the electoral system is reformed
21.30%

5.10%

73.70%

More Likely

Less Likely

No Change In Likelihood

Electoral College

National Popular Vote

Proportional Allocation

Congressional District Model

Ranked Choice Voting

Approval Voting

Range (Score) Voting

Other

Figure 6. Likelihood of respondents voting in presidential
elections if the electoral college is reformed by party affiliation
90.00%
80.00%
70.00%
60.00%
50.00%
40.00%
30.00%
20.00%
10.00%
0.00%

Democratic

Republican

No Change in Likelihood

Libertarian
More Likely

Independent

Other

Less Likely

23

Figure 7. Electoral reform preferences by party
Other
Range (Score) Voting
Approval Voting
Ranked Choice Voting
Congressional District Model
Proportional Allocation
National Popular Vote
Electoral College
0.00%
Other

10.00%
Independent

20.00%

30.00%

Libertarian

40.00%

Republican

50.00%

60.00%

70.00%

Democratic

Conclusions and Discussion
In total, the sample size (n) of survey respondents was 316. Demographically,
respondents represented every age, sex, and party category with the exception of the
Green Party. Respondents largely identified as female and Democratic, and the
majority were in the youngest generation (age 18-25).
As demonstrated by Table 1, now President Joe Biden would have won the 2020
presidential election under all electoral systems tested in the survey. The Electoral
College method (how it is currently conducted and thus acts as the control for this
survey) results in former Vice President Joe Biden winning 306 electoral votes (thirtysix votes more than the required 270) over incumbent President Donald Trump’s 232
electoral votes. The National Popular Vote also gives Biden a victory with a margin of
24

7,052,770 votes. Awarding votes by proportional allocation shows a much tighter race,
but still with Joe Biden winning. Under this system, he would have received 273
electoral votes (three more than is required) to then President Donald Trump’s 255
electoral votes. Biden also would have won under ranked choice voting, with 221
respondents (approximately 70%) ranking the Biden-Harris ticket as their number 1
choice, with seventy-nine respondents (approximately 25%) ranking the Trump-Pence
ticket as their number 2 choice. Because the Biden-Harris ticket received the majority
of first place votes, a run-off would not occur, and they would be declared the winner.
The Biden-Harris ticket would also emerge victorious under range (score) voting.
Under this system, the Biden- Harris ticket would receive a score of 3.37, compared to
the Trump-Pence ticket’s score of 1.43. It is worth noting that this system also saw the
Libertarian ticket, Jorgensen-Cohen, receive a higher score than the Trump-Pence
ticket. Their ticket wins a score of 1.71. Finally, the Biden- Harris ticket wins under
approval voting as well, with 235 (approximately 76.1%) respondents stating that they
would approve of Biden being president, compared to eighty-nine (approximately
28.8%) respondents that selected Trump. The Libertarian ticket also made significant
headway in this system as well, with sixty-five (approximately 21%) respondents either
selecting just Jorgensen-Cohen or selecting them with at least one of the major party
tickets. I hypothesized that electoral reform would not produce results different from the
control (the Electoral College), and these results support that hypothesis.
Respondents were also asked questions about their participation in presidential
elections. As seen in Figure 4, a supermajority of respondents (73.7%) indicate that
electoral reform would not change their likelihood of participating in presidential

25

elections, with 21.3% saying electoral reform would make them more likely to participate
and 5.1% saying electoral reform would make them less likely to participate. A
supermajority is considered either 2/3 (approximately 67%) or 3/5 (approximately 60%),
depending on the setting. Due to the large number of respondents stating that electoral
reform would not change their likelihood of participating but a smaller percentage stating
that it would make them more likely, it is possible that voter turnout could see a small
increase depending on how the Electoral College were reformed. This also indicates that
electoral reform is not a driving factor in voter turnout in presidential elections. If it were,
we would expect that significantly more respondents would have chosen the “more
likely” option. This pattern holds true by party identification as well. As seen in figure 6,
respondents of all party identifications indicate that electoral reform would result in no
change in likelihood of participating in presidential elections. The Libertarians at 66.7%
had the smallest number of respondents that chose “no change in likelihood.” This means
that other variables and other possibilities should be explored in more depth to pinpoint
the major factors that depress turnout. This data does support my hypothesis that electoral
reform would increase turnout. With 5.1% of respondents saying they would be less
likely to participate in presidential elections and 21.3% of respondents saying electoral
reform would make them more likely to participate, that leaves the potential for a net
increase in turnout of 16.2%. This of course does not mean, as stated before but should
be reiterated, that turnout would increase as other factors are likely at play that depress
turnout and would likely need resolved before seeing substantial turnout increases.
Preferences for voting systems are more diverse and show that Americans are
more split on what the best way is for electing the president than originally expected. A

26

slight majority, as can be seen in figure 5, favor abolition of the Electoral College and
the implementation of a national popular vote (52.1%). The remaining 47.9% of
respondents were extremely divided over which electoral system they preferred, with
the Electoral College coming in second with 18.5% and ranked choice voting coming in
third with 16%. Breaking it down by party shows some interesting patterns as well.
When evaluating the results for the national popular vote, all represented parties exceed
40.00% support, however only Democrats, Independents, and Other reach or surpass
50.00% support (Republican support comes in at 44.1% and Libertarian support comes
in at 44.4%). A similar pattern emerges with preferences by party for the Electoral
College, where neither Democrats nor Independents reach 20.0% support (15.2% and
7.7%, respectively), while both Republicans and Libertarians exceed 20.0% support
(36.8% and 22.2% respectively). Democrats and Independents tend to be closer in
agreement while Republicans and Libertarians tend to be closer in agreement on this
issue. This pattern holds true for all electoral systems tested with the exception of
ranked choice voting, where Democrats, Libertarians, and Independents all reach or
exceed 10.0% support, and Republicans fall short of that support threshold, and range
(score) voting, where Libertarian support exceeds 10.0%, but no other party affiliation
reaches that threshold. Overall, regardless of party affiliation, respondents are divided
over electoral system preferences, with the greatest support from all party affiliations
falling under the national popular vote, thus the data supports my hypothesis that the
national popular vote would be the most preferred option.

27

Future Research
Additional research that could be conducted would go more in depth with the
voter turnout aspect of this study. An important step for future research would include a
survey question asking about their participation in presidential elections under the
current system. Determining whether respondents are regular voters, semi-regular
voters, or non-regular voters could provide greater insight into how different variables
influence whether someone shows up at the polls or not. An expansion on respondents’
preferences could also be beneficial by determining which electoral system would make
them more likely, less likely, or have no change in their likelihood of participating in
presidential elections.
As mentioned earlier, voter turnout over the last century has been on the decline.
Additional research that could add on to this study could also ask respondents why they
are regular, semi-regular, or non-regular voters. Inquiring about why semi-regular and
non-regular voters do not vote regularly would also give greater insights into the decline
in voter turnout and what can be done to reverse that trend. Topics that could be tested
include policy questions, political polarization, ballot options and/or format, or leaving it
as an open-ended question so respondents could explain on their own and then the
researcher could look for patterns as to why Americans do not regularly vote or do not
vote at all.

28

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