Electoral

Pertaining to election or electors. Electoral College. The body of the electors chosen by the people of the U. S. to elect their President and Vice-president.-The Electoral College is the outcome of a difficulty experienced by the Constitutional Convention in deciding who would be the best judges of the fitne of the candidates for the offices named-the people, or a select body chosen by the people; this body to be either Congre , or delegates selected for this expre purpose. It was doubted if the people as a whole would be the best judges of a candidate's qualifications for the high office of National Executive; and it was finally decided to let the people choose men whose proficiency they knew, and let this chosen body elect candidates of their own choice. The method fixed upon was that the people of each State should vote for as many electors as they had members in Congre , these to be free from connection with the Government, and the choice of the President and Vice-president to be left wholly in their hands. As is well known, this plan has not had the effect for which it was designed. The electors, as now chosen, are pledged to support certain previously selected candidates, and the choice of the President has fallen so strictly into the hands of the people that it has been proposed to do away with the Electoral College as usele and cumbersome. and have these officers elected directly by the popular vote. The law governing the duty of the electors provides that they shall meet within a fixed period after the date of their election, cast their votes and transmit the result to the seat of Government by the fourth Monday of the following January. On the second Wednesday of February, following, a joint se ion of the two Houses of Congre is held, with the President of the Senate as presiding officer, whose duty it is to open the certificates of the electoral vote, and hand them to tellers who have been appointed to make a list of and count the votes, and deliver the result of their count to the presiding officer, who thereupon announces the same to the a embled Congre . This announcement is deemed a final and sufficient declaration and guarantee of the election of the persons so chosen President and Vice-President of the U. S. The principal objection to the Electoral College system is that it does not fairly represent the choice of the people, and that through its agency a candidate may be elected President who has not received a majority of the votes of the people of the U. S.; in other words, that a candidate may receive a large majority of the votes and yet fail of election by the Electoral College. Elec'to rate, Electoral'ity, n. [Fr. élector at ; Sp. elector a do; It. elettorato .] The territory of an elector, as formerly in Germany.