Must electors vote for the candidate who won their State's popular vote?

There is no Constitutional provision or Federal law that requires electors to vote according to the results of the popular vote in their States. Some States, however, require electors to cast their votes according to the popular vote. These pledges fall into two categories -- electors bound by State law and those bound by pledges to political parties.

Which States bind electors to popular vote results? Refer to Electors Bound by State Law and Pledges to find out.

The Supreme Court has held that the Constitution does not require that electors be completely free to act as they choose and therefore, political parties may extract pledges from electors to vote for the parties' nominees. Some State laws provide that so-called "faithless electors" may be subject to fines or may be disqualified for casting an invalid vote and be replaced by a substitute elector. The Supreme Court has not specifically ruled on the question of whether pledges and penalties for failure to vote as pledged may be enforced under the Constitution. No elector has ever been prosecuted for failing to vote as pledged.

Today, it is rare for electors to disregard the popular vote by casting their electoral vote for someone other than their party's candidate. Electors generally hold a leadership position in their party or were chosen to recognize years of loyal service to the party. Throughout our history as a nation, more than 99 percent of electors have voted as pledged.

This is from the above link.

It is still kind of ambiguous, huh???

Poplular vote by all the American people.

ok question

we eliminated electrol system

and we have 4 candidates

candidate

a get 37% of the vote

b gets 34%

c gets 22%

and d gets 9%

who wins

A of course, why do you ask?

Is this the percentage of the 2000 elections and Bush was the 34%?

they did recieve the most but

did not recieve the majority of the votes


i say runn off top 2

made it all up as hypathetical

I went to Subway university, but I dropped out after I learned to make the cold cut combo.

well ya gotta keep yer strength up


so ya can get to the polls

Majority should count even if it is one vote, in my opinion. The popular vote should count if the electoral college does not coincide, in my opinion.

Subway is good

majority is over 50%

the most can be any number greater than the others

if you can win by less than a majority

why bother your vote will be worthless

and back to two party system

the only way to get away from two party system

is popular vote needing over 50% to win

that way you could vote for non two major party runners

and not think you are wasting your vote

cause if they stop a majority win

you get a revote and then get to choose

from the 2 highest vote getters

getting the most votes without having a majority

should not win

Actually the primary is suppose to do that, right? Two primaries? Hey, I would not have a problem with that. Voting is my duty to our government so I faithfully vote, not a problem.

popular vote.i believe more would vote if they thought that it actually counted...now that jury duty is attached to drivers license that excuse is removed so lets get rid of another one.yes i vote..

Popular Vote would ensure that the areas of the country with the most people would basicaly decide who becomes President. That would mean California and NY!

I do not want to have a bunch of Yankees and Cal-I-forn-I ayes telling me whats best for me! No thank you!!

Not a good idea!!

us yankees aint so bad !!

They arent, your right, but the wants, wishes, and trials of day to day life arent even close!

The electorial College vote is the most fair and balanced way to elect the President! Everyone is saying, "oh, the electors can vote against the people."

Sure, but when has that ever happenned? _________(insert answer)

When have you even heard of the electorial votes from a given State split?________(insert answer)

There has only been 2 times in history that the popular vote and the electorial vote has differed! When?_______(insert answer here)

If the electorial vote from any State went against the popular vote of that state, how long do you think that person, or people would retain their office?______(insert answer here) then I'll tell you the differences between your state and mine!

We could start with immigration!
Northern States have no idea!!

well glenn we just have different kinds of immigration like indonesians,africans and russians.believe me we have a clue.and we have quite the spanish speaking poulation that has spilled over from massachussets.
anyway tell me the difference between our states..

New Hampshire???

Y'all talk funny!!

11 electorial votes!

about 700,000 illegal immigrants!

I was going to say isolation, but Im not so sure of that! New Hampshire!!!

Taxes, Im sure. We pay heavy State income taxes, but we enjoy the autonomy from the Federal gov!

Tourism, teenage pregnancy?, abortion, Im sure there are more!!

I just googled New Hampshire. There are a lot of similarites, except taxes, size, the bible-belt, and tourism!

Y'all aint really Yankees are you!