text: To commence, the Electoral College should be eradicated because it is simply unreliable. The result of a direct election would be more transparent and would make the citizens of this country certain the election was democratic and just. The issue lies in the fact that voters are technically only voting for electors to cast a vote for a candidate, and not for a candidate themselves. These electors pledge to vote in favor of the candidate who rightly wins the popular vote in a state, but some attempt to be defiant. For instance, according to Bradford Plumer's article, "Back in 1960, segregationists in the Lousiana legislature nearly succeeded in replacing the Democratic electors with new electors who would oppose John F. Kennedy" (11). If the Lousiana legislature was successful in their attempt to be defiant, electoral votes would not go to Kennedy despite him winning the popular vote in that state. Another way in which the Electoral College is unreliable is that it allows for a tied vote. There are 538 electoral votes in the system currently in use, meaning it is possible for two candidates to receive 269 votes each. This may seem unlikely, but it is more likely to occur than some might think. For instance, as according to Plumer's aforementioned article, an electoral tie would have occured in 1968 if only 41,971 more votes were for the losing candidate. Additionally, in the 1976 election, if 5,559 voters in the swing state of Ohio, and 3,687 voters in Hawaii had simply voted in favor of the candidate with the minority of the votes, a tie would have occured. In order to resolve a tie, the House of Representatives casts votes to decide the winner of the election. At this point, the impact of each representative is skewed so representatives of states with lower population can more easily decide the state's vote. This happens because each state only votes once, so the few representatives of a small state such as Nebraska can decide who to vote for rather easily, while in California, 55 representatives with different views must colloborate to cast a single vote. With so much unreliability, why is the outdated system of the Electoral College still in use?