The first time we had a contested presidential election, the electoral college fouled us up. The next election, the electoral college REALLY fouled us up. The first time we had a popular-vote election, the electoral college fouled us up. The latest time we had a presidential election, the electoral college fouled us up. And it’s fouled us up repeatedly in between.
The founding fathers were nervous about democracy, which was still a brand-new experiment. So they ruled that the people would elect the representatives in Congress, but an elite group – the state legislators – would elect the senators. And a SUPER-elite… the presidential electors… would elect the president and vice-president.
This fouled up the 1796 and 1800 elections so badly that they amended the Constitution, improving things a little. By 1824 there was a new wrinkle. Electors still chose the president, but in most states the VOTERS chose the ELECTORS. This made selection of the president MORE LIKELY to be the voters’ choice, but not ASSUREDLY the voters’ choice.
With four men running in 1824, nobody got a majority of the electoral votes. This meant that the House of Representatives picked the president from the top three, but – get this – the states got one vote apiece, no matter how many people they had! And if the state delegation split, they cast no vote at all!
Anyhow, Andrew Jackson was the clear winner by plurality, with 41% of the popular vote compared to 31% for John Quincy Adams, with Crawford and Clay splitting the remainder almost evenly. The House, though, chose Adams.
A popular book right now is about “accidental presidents” – those who’ve succeeded on the predecessors’ deaths or resignations. Quincy Adams was the first of six “loser presidents” or “presidential rejects” – those who had to assume the nation’s highest office after the nation rejected them.
Young Adams in many ways looked superbly qualified. He had been a senator, a representative, an ambassador, and secretary of state. He’d been active in the Revolution even as a boy, and he’d helped end the War of 1812. None of this would help very much.
Like his father, John Quincy Adams had two handicaps. First, that he was usually the smartest person in the room. And second, that he knew it. Each of them were good at behind-closed-doors politics – not meaning anything crooked, just that they were cerebral men who worked well by quiet, face-to-face negotiations. Neither one was happy with the broader politics of crowds and speeches and nationwide campaigns.
And, of course, Quincy Adams had to do his job even though the voters had decided NOT to have him do the job. It’s as if an employer had chosen to hire the other candidate, but the government swooped in and forced him to take you instead. He wouldn’t be very happy, and you’d be batting with two and a-half strikes against you.
President Adams had some successes, but failed in much of his program: a naval academy, a national observatory, a national university, uniform weights and measures. In 1828 Jackson was back, and by then 22 of the 24 states chose their electors by popular vote. Jackson outpolled Adams 56% to 44%, though winning the electoral college by more than two-to-one (another example of how ridiculous the system is).
John Quincy Adams was a patriot, and a brilliant man, and even after the White House he served our country with distinction until struck down by cerebral hemorrhage on the floor of Congress while loudly objecting (quite rightly) to the Mexican War. Carried to the Speaker’s Room, he died there in the Capitol two days later, in 1848. In the right circumstances, he could have been a great president. Forced to take office after being rejected, his leadership could only be poor. He was doomed to one indifferent term, and the country suffered accordingly. His greatest days came before and after his presidency.