Does the electoral college help minorities?

I am going to state, no, it does not help minorities.

The automatic allowance of 2 electors per state diminishes the positive impact of concentration within a few select states.

In its current winner take all configuration, it doesn’t help. If the electoral college went to giving one EC vote for winning a congressional district, and 2 for winning the state, then minority votes would play a more significant role.

Nope. It hurts them. Minorities tend to be concentrated in large states. Smaller states are more likely to be ethnically homogeneous. Since small states are equal in power to large states in that they all get only two additional votes in the EC, the power of the large states is diminished a bit, and with that, the power of minority voters is diminished.

Actually, this analysis depends on whether my understanding of the EC is correct. I’m thinking that each state gets one EC vote for every member of congress they have.

For example, states like Montana and Alaska and Vermont, which all have only one congressman, have two senators and thus three votes apiece in the EC. Since those states are mostly all white, they will send their states in the direction the white voters want, with no influence from minority voters. Since each state is equal in the final voting, the power of large states (with minority voters) is diminished compared to the power of small states (with no minority voters) in the final election.

@wundayatta I see your logic. I knew I had to be missing something when I was trying to figure this out. I have heard the arguments about small states and large states, but not concerning minority populations living in said states. the very small states actually get more power than they should in the EC, because they get 3 votes even if their population is only 100 people in the state. But, what you are saying is no matter what, as long as the minority is a minority in the state they live in, their vote is basically lost. The population of the entire state would have to swing to the minority being a majority to really make the difference, because of how most states require all EC votes to all go one way.

Ok, so that means, if all the black people moved to three states, their vote would be stronger than if they live in a bunch of states as a minority percentage. Right? Assuming they generally all vote the same way. I was just looking on this site and MS is 37% black. That is incredibly high. GA is 30%.

First off, Jews aren’t a minority.

Second, the power of the minority vote lies in turnout. If 2008 was like most elections, we would have probably had a President McCain. But the historic nature of Obama’s campaign increased turnout dramatically, especially among blacks. If minority communities want to increase their power and influence, encouraging voter education and participation is the key.

@cletrans2col I don’t know what country you live in. Here in the US, Jews are considered a minority —they make up less than 2% of the US population

@SpatzieLover most Jews are white. White=/=minority

Another thing to keep in mind redistricting/gerrymandering can have a significant impact before the votes are even cast; improving or reducing the impact any particular group can have based on the designs of those doing the dividing.

@cletrans2col Jews are not an oppressed or protected minority in the US, but their vote is considered by most groups who analyze demographics and psychogtaphics regarding Presidential elections. Jews as a group are very very small, about 2%, as mentioned by Spatzie, of the country’s population. In spite of their small numbers they are influential for a few reasons, including they have dense numbers in some cities. And, as a Jewish woman II certainly feel like a minority down here in the bible belt as I hear so many many people call America a Christian Country in a tone that is insistant, fearful, and offensive, all at once. My idenity, psyche, is at least a little influenced by knowing there are people who are out there who still like to set off bombs in front of synagogues. I do overall feel the country is open to me, no obstacles, but I still also very much feel I am a religious minority. But, I digress.

@wundayatta, there are 100 electors representing the Senate, 435 addional electors representing the House and the District of Columbia gets the same number of electors as the least populus state or 3 electors. So, there are 538 presidential electors. The electors are distributed amongst the states according to the total number of US Senators and US Reps. in each state.

Here’s an example to consider, California is the largest state. There are about 33 million residents who have 55 electors. Each elector represents some 614,000 residents. Wyoming, the smallest state population-wise, has about 500,000 residents and gets 3 electors; one for about every 160,000 residents. Really, Wyoming voters have more strength than California voters.

(I edited my mistake on California’s electors.)

Thank you, @bkcunningham