Rick Green [00:00:07] Welcome to Intersection of Faith and Culture. This is the WallBuilders Show where we take on the hot topics of the day from a biblical, historical and constitutional perspective. I'm Rick Green, America's Constitution coach with David and Tim Barton. I'm going to jump back in to the election special programing that David and Tim did. This is good stuff to share to folks. So we're just a few weeks out from this huge election. Take today's program, share it with as many friends and family as you possibly can. Let's jump in. Here's David a Tim Barton with our election special programing. 

David Barton [00:00:32] Elections are a core foundation of our American government. And the early days, political debates were held in theaters and lecture halls across America like this one. Drawing large crowds from every corner of society. Now we engage with the candidates through TV screens and Twitter feeds, watching as the elections unfold. 

Tim Barton [00:00:50] The spotlight may be on the top contenders, but it's really about the people. Today, we're going to talk about our role and this important election process. 

David Barton [00:00:58] By understanding where elections came from and how they work. You can help determine who will be in the room when our nation's most important decisions are being made. Today's lawmakers are tomorrow's History shapers. I'm David Barton. 

Tim Barton [00:01:11] I'm Tim Barton. And this is elections. As we look at elections, one of the important questions is how do we choose a president in America? The president has always been the iconic political figure who has represented the entire nation. And there has been some really good presidential leaders in America and some not very good presidential leaders. And for some of the really good leaders, there have been very defining moments for them. When JFK said, ask not what your country can do for you, but ask what you can do for your country. When FDR said the only thing we have to fear is fear itself. Or when Ronald Reagan said, Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall. Really defining moments for those presidents. And there also were times in American history where there were presidents who some of their defining moments were really bad and dark moments, such as Andrew Jackson, where there was a trail of tears, the relocation of the Indians and the abusive mistreatment that occurred under his presidency or under Woodrow Wilson, who was a very racist man himself and under his administration was the rebirth of the KKK, His administration, many of the members from his own cabinet actually were out marching with the KKK through the streets of Washington, D.C.. That's a really dark and bad moment. So we have to ask the question, well, how do we get good presidents? How do we avoid bad presidents? And what part do we play in the process? 

David Barton [00:02:36] This is a question the founding fathers asked because as they are writing the Constitution, they have said we're going to have a president. Article two of the Constitution. Here's who he is and here's what he's to do. Except they've never had a president before. So the question is, okay, under the new constitution, how do we choose a president? And so they came up with various ideas as they're debating. And one of the ideas was, well, let's let Congress choose the president. Made some sense. But then they said, but, you know, if we do that, if Congress chooses the president, we're supposed to be a separate branch from him, but now he'll be beholden to Congress. And so we'll really lose the checks and balance if we're supposed to have a right in this. Don't like Congress to choose the president. And by the way, it also opens it up to corruption of foreign influence. And that foreign leader can come in and buy Congress from a handful of congressmen a lot faster than they can by a bunch of people. So it's probably not a good idea. So the next idea was, okay, let's set the states choose the president. And that was a pretty good idea because that's really important in the Constitution. But then said, but you know, if we let the states choose the president, then that really kind of violates a separation of powers. We've established in the Constitution between the federal and the state government, because the state governors are supposed to be able to check the federal government and vice versa. But now the president would be beholden to the states, so we lose that check and balance is okay. How about the people? Let the people. That's really important because this is a government of the people, says we the people, to top the Constitution. That's really good. But then the objection is raised. People like George Hillhouse is a member, the very first Congress, and said, you know, the problem with that is all the big states can get together. You could have Massachusetts and New York and Pennsylvania and Virginia all get together and say, we don't care about you. Other nine states, we're going to choose the president. And you guys don't have any. And he says you could have a combination of population centers get together and shut off the voice of the rest of the people, rest of the nation. And if you lived in a rural state, you would never have a voice in choosing the president. It would be up to the big cities. And so they said that. That's a good point. Why don't we do something that takes a combination of this, which is what we now call the Electoral College. It's unique. There's no other nation in the world that has a system like they came up with back then. It's been a super successful system where there says, we want to include the voice of the people, which is really important, along with the voice of the states, which is really important. So here's the system we can do to create that. 

Tim Barton [00:05:10] So what is the Electoral College and how does it really work? 

Speaker [00:05:17] What is the Electoral College? Most people have heard of the Electoral College during presidential elections, but what is the Electoral College and how does it work? The balance of power was a big deal to our nation's founders. The Electoral College was created to ensure balance and give all 50 states a fair voice in the election process. A president wins the election by electoral votes. There are 538 electoral votes that are divided up between the states. That number is based on the total voting membership of the United States Congress or 135 representatives plus 100 senators, plus three electors from DC. Each state gets a certain amount of these 538 electoral votes based on their population. The bigger the population, the more votes. Texas has 38 votes. Florida gets 29. You get the picture. But get this. In most states, the candidate who wins the popular vote wins all of the state's electoral votes. That's right. Winner takes all. Even if the voting is close. So if a candidate wins the most votes in Texas, they get all 38 of the Texas electoral votes. If they win the most votes in Florida, even by just a small amount, they get all 29 of those electoral votes. That's why it's rare but possible for a candidate to lose the popular vote but win the electoral vote. Just as Rutherford behaves, George W Bush or even Donald Trump, at the end of the day, the electoral votes from each state are tallied to determine the ultimate winner. The candidate with the majority vote in the Electoral College gets elected. 

Tim Barton [00:06:53] Seeing how the Electoral College works, it actually gives you a greater appreciation for the brilliance involved in forming this system. This was not easy for them to put together. And one of the things is even kind of interesting, too is how did they determine what what votes we're going to be ascribed to, what states? Because even though the people are a part of the process, states do have a weighted vote. So how do states get different percentages of votes and how does that really work?  

David Barton [00:07:18] Yeah, well, we called the Electoral College. I mean, you got to understand, it's not a college. It's not that at all. What you do is you have a popular vote and the state and the voters in the states say, here's who we want. And you have electors out of that state that will assemble and what's called the Electoral College and cast a vote for that state for the candidate chosen by the state. So how many votes are that? Well, what they did was they said, okay, for every U.S. senator you have, you get a vote. And for every congressman you have you get an electoral vote. 

Tim Barton [00:07:48] Now, every senator is two for every state, right? So every state automatically has two votes for their senators. And then to say you're going to get one vote for every congressman and congressman is based on population on representation. So now it does seem like if you are a bigger state and you have a bigger population, well, then that's going to be really important for you having a bigger vote, which certainly is the case. But now we are still giving weights in some regards to every state, saying that every state is going to already have at least two for the Senate. And then every state has at least one congressman, even though some states have a much smaller population than others and. 

David Barton [00:08:24] Some have a larger population. And that's that's really one of the cool things. When they wrote the Constitution, they came up with a bicameral system. When you have a legislature at the national level assembled, you have a small state like Rhode Island with a small population. And so you have a state like Virginia has a big population. Every vote in Congress, Virginia is going to get its way and Rhode Island never get a voice. So they said, let's create two bodies. We'll have a House in the Senate and in the House that'll be all about your population. So today, if you're California, the most populous state, you have 54 votes in the House of Representatives. If you happen to be the state of Montana, you have one vote in the House of Representatives. So if Montana wants to take on California, they're going to lose every time. But we also have a U.S. Senate. And in the Senate, every state has equal votes. Every state gets two senators. So you have Montana with two senators and you have California with two senators. They're equal in the Senate. And so what you have is a bicameral system where the people have a voice, but the states also have a voice. If it was just the people having a voice, all the rural areas would get no representation. And if it was just the states having the voice, then population wouldn't matter. So they brought that together and the Electoral College and said, okay, so for every senator you get an electoral vote and for every representative you get electoral vote. So for a state like California, what you've got is 54 representatives and two senators. So they have 56 electoral votes. For a state like Montana, they have two senators and one representative. So they have three electoral votes. So as you go around all the states in the United States, what you have is 435 congressmen in the House. So that's 435 electoral votes. You have a hundred senators in the Senate. That's another 100 electoral votes. That puts us at 500. 35 electoral votes. But we also have Washington, DC. They're not a state, but in 1961 we added the 23rd Amendment that said. But you know what? Washington, D.C. gets to have as many electoral votes as a smaller state. So Washington, D.C. has three electoral votes. It now makes 538 electoral votes. So to become the president, United States, you have to win half of the electoral votes. Not all the popular vote, not all the states. It's a combination of both of them. And so you have to have 270 electoral votes to win, which means you got to win a bunch of states and you got to win a bunch of the people. It's a brilliant system that came up. 

Tim Barton [00:10:54] It really is a great combination of saying we're going to give power to the States, but also we're gonna give power to the people in those states. And this is something that today there's a lot of discussion about. Is this still the best way to do it or is there a better way to do it? And the founding fathers had many of those discussions and debates. We just need to dig a little deeper and find out what they said. 

Speaker [00:11:14] When it comes to choosing a president, why don't we use the electoral vote instead of the popular vote to determine the winner? What did the popular vote make more sense? Consider this. There are 35,000 cities and towns in America. 20 of those cities have a greater population than the other 34,980 combined. The electoral vote gives each state a voice in order to represent the great diversity that exists across America. It allows all the unique voices to be heard. Rural and urban. Industrial and agricultural. Blue collar and white collar. Small cities and large cities. Small states and large states. The popular vote is based on the total amount of individual votes a candidate gets across the U.S. This is typically won by the candidate gaining the most votes from big cities and urban areas. Larger populations equal more votes. This means that California, Texas, Florida, New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois and Ohio dominate the popular vote by the millions. For a candidate, the popular vote is a little like trying to get the popular kids attention at school. If you're working to get noticed and accepted by the popular kids, how likely are you to pay attention to the needs of the less known or popular? Not very. The electoral vote gives every state a chance to be heard. For example, if a candidate loses the vote of one of the more populated states like California, New York or Florida, but goes on to win the votes of several less populated or less popular states. The candidate could still take home the win. This means a candidate can't ignore these less populated states because in a close election, every electoral vote counts. Which means every state counts. And that's why we use the electoral vote. 

Tim Barton [00:12:51] As we look at electing presidents. We see that there is a distinction between the national popular vote and the Electoral College. Although when you look at the combination of the two, most presidents that win the presidency actually win the majority of the population vote and the Electoral College, in fact, one of my favorite examples is George Washington, because not only was he elected by the majority of the population, he actually was the only president to unanimously be elected by the Electoral College. So the majority of every single state said, that's the guy we want. Nobody else said that honor. 

David Barton [00:13:26] Yeah. Washington unanimous and should have been because historians agree with that. Washington There is no United States of America. That's why he's called the indispensable man in modern biographies about him. 

Rick Green [00:13:37] Quick break everybody. We'll be right back. You're listening to The WallBuilders Show. 

Break [00:13:40]  

Rick Green [00:14:48] Welcome back to the WallBuilders Show. Jumping right back in with David and Tim Barton on today's election special. 

David Barton [00:14:52] Washington almost had some competition Electoral College, because when James Monroe was chosen president, he was the fifth president. He, too, was going to have a unanimous vote. And one of the electors said, no, no, no, no. Washington needs to be the only guy. He needs that distinction of being the only guy. So one elector cast his vote against Monroe knowing that wouldn't make a difference but wanted to keep Washington there that elevated spot. 

Tim Barton [00:15:16] And that actually makes me respect Monroe a little bit more in that regard, because certainly if you look at George Washington, well, Washington did starting his military career back in the French and Indian War and then as commander of the military forces throughout the American Revolution, he was the guy in charge of the Constitutional convention where we wrote the Constitution. He's the first president. So much of what we have in America could not have happened. America couldn't have existed arguably without George Washington. So even though Monroe was clearly popular enough to win, the majority of actually win every electoral vote, but there was one guy who thought, you're not a special as George Washington, I, I want to know who that guy was. I appreciate that guy that he took that position. There's people in closer, more modern era also who did very well because if you have Ronald Reagan, this was a little before my cognizance in the political realm because I was just a wee child that at that point. But Ronald Reagan in the Mondale election, not only did he win the popular vote, he won 49 out of 50 states for the Electoral College, just a landslide for Ronald Reagan. So what you see is for most presidents, not only do they win the majority of the popular vote. Right. That the majority of the people in America vote for that person. They also win the Electoral College. But you do see a few rare occasions where someone didn't win the majority of the popular vote, but they won the majority of the state's  so they won the Electoral College because maybe, for example, they didn't win California and New York, but they won almost everything else. Well, California, New York had a pretty big population hub. So it's possible that you lost a couple of states where the majority of the population of America is, or at least a majority of voters, and you still won the election. So historically, back up before there were even 50 states, the six president of United States, John Quincy Adams, that happened for him. 

David Barton [00:17:02] Yet John Quincy Adams was really a very popular guy. I mean, he was a guy that goes all the way back to the American war for independence. And he got his start very young. At eight years old. He's got his mascot, the Massachusetts Minutemen. At ten years old, he's actually the secretary to the ambassador to France Congress. 

Tim Barton [00:17:18] Who happened to be his father. And it's clear his dad, John, Congress was like, yeah, you can go with your dad, keep notes for him. It's fine. That still is impressive to have a ten year old in the room with world leaders and diplomats. So. So not to look down on that too much. But he did go with his father. And when he was ten, I think 11 when he was 14, he had another appointment at. 

David Barton [00:17:36] 14, Congress sent him to the court of Catherine the Great. Russia became the official translator. So he's at 14 years old and he spoke six languages at the time. He becomes actually the guy who helps arrange the peace treaty and the revolution Congress sent him there. So he has an early start. And the American Revolution, he becomes a diplomat under George Washington. Washington said he's the best foreign diplomat we have our hands down. He is a diplomat under his father, President John Adams. He was a U.S. senator under President Thomas Jefferson, under the fourth president, James Madison. He goes back to being a diplomat, actually negotiated the end of the war of 1812 under the fifth president, James Monroe. He's secretary of state. And then he is now really popular. Well, now he's running for president to be the sixth president of United States. And so his name is out there, really well known. But there's a lot of people running for president. He's not the only guy. And so as the results come in, nobody has a clear majority of all the votes. Having a majority of the popular votes, having a majority of the electoral votes. And so what do you do in a situation where wisely the founding fathers said, if we ever have a situation where that nobody gets a clear majority of the Electoral College votes, then the House of Representatives gets to choose the president. So his election was thrown into the House of Representatives and a lot of negotiation going back and forth. And eventually the House of Representatives says John Quincy Adams, is our sixth president. 

Tim Barton [00:18:59] Well, and there's also lots of other situations in American history and actually lots maybe a little excessive. But there were other presidents who also did not win the majority of the popular vote, but they won the majority of the states With the Electoral College. You had Rutherford behaved, you had Benjamin Harrison, you had George W Bush and recently Donald Trump. And this is where there now was some controversy with people again saying we don't like the Electoral College because the popular vote should win. The people that champion the popular vote don't really understand the electoral college process. Why was put in place and how it actually protects the majority of the states from the really large cities in a just a very few states? And there's a movement today to say that we really need to abolish the Electoral College. Let's move only to the national popular vote as we identified. That's. A pretty scary thought that 20 cities would be able to control the entire nation and say, well, based on these 20 cities, this is your president. Is that really disenfranchizes millions upon millions upon millions of Americans and really devalues the whole process because it doesn't allow the majority of the people to be involved in the process. 

David Barton [00:20:08] And even if you choose something like Donald Trump's election, which is very controversial because he did not win the popular vote, but he won the Electoral College, when you look at it, the various ways of weighting the vote. Donald Trump won 30 of the 50 states. If you vote by state, then he wins a clear majority there. If you vote by national popular vote, where you disregard all state lines and you just take in all the national vote, he lost by a few percentage points there, he certainly had less. And so, again, the Electoral College system works to combine the states with the popular vote. And sometimes you can, as you mentioned, have five presidents out of all the ones we've had that didn't win the popular vote, but they did win the state vote by a large enough margin become president. So when you look at maybe getting rid of that system and going solely to the popular vote, as you said, cities would dominate that. But also the current proposal is we're going to say our state, that our electoral votes are many. We have if it were Texas, it would be some 36 votes. We're going to say whoever wins the national popular vote, we're given all of our electoral votes to them. Well, that becomes a problem because if you take a state like Wyoming, which is a very Republican state, about 70% Republican, or if you take Washington DC, which is over 90% Democrat, let's say that Washington, DC votes for the Democratic candidate, but let's say the Republican candidate wins the entire popular vote. Can you imagine what happens in DC when they learned that all the votes they cast of going to the Republican? Or if you're in Wyoming and you voted strongly for a Republican candidate and the Democrat won the popular vote and now Wyoming said, wait a minute, we voted for the Republican Senate, now our electoral votes are going to the Democratic Senate. So I don't think they've thought through what the backlash will be when people figure out that my vote really doesn't count for what I cast it, we're giving our state votes away. And so, again, the Electoral College system is so brilliant, anticipated so many things. So why is the way they did that? 200. 

Tim Barton [00:22:05] Yeah, most people think of how will this benefit me right now on the short term and they don't really think what are the consequences in the future. And the founding fathers try to think way into the future. What is this going to look like? How can we make sure that everybody has a voice? Because even right now, if you take the states of California and New York and Illinois, just the populations of those states, they actually have enough population. When you look at presidential voting, they have enough population that they could pretty much choose a president almost by themselves if they voted in unison together. Well, that would be scary for the rest of the nation to think, wait a second, three states are going to control 47 states. The founding fathers wisely said, let's have a system that the people have a very strong voice, but we want to make sure that all the people in every state have a strong voice. So let's make sure that we include all of the states so it can't just be the people from a few cities. You have to have the majority of the cities in the majority of the states. It really is a brilliant system. And one of the old adages is before you tear down a fence, you need to know why the fence was there in the first place. Don't tear it down. Now the neighbors cows get out or whatever the case is. We need to know why something was there before we tear down and before there is a movement to remove the Electoral College, we probably need to do a little more research and learn why was this there and why does it actually benefit us when we choose a president? It actually is a very good system. 

Speaker [00:23:26] The civil arena can be an intimidating place, but the more informed you are, the more empowered you will be to get involved. Voting is not just a right, it's a responsibility. As Christians, we are called to steward the nation God has placed us in. But stewardship starts long before you head to the polls. First, remember this choose principles over party. Look at what the Bible says about education, life, economics, marriage, family, immigration, religious liberty. And then choose the party and the candidates that best mirror those values principles over party. Second, it's important to support the good, quality candidates running for public office. Although the candidate who stands for godly values may often be bullied, belittled, attacked or ignored by the media, this is not an insurmountable problem. A candidate can overcome the media with a strong grassroots team lifting him up. So when you find a good candidate, get involved, offer whatever financial support, you can volunteer some of your time, even if it's only an hour to voice and show your support for those candidates in the community. Vote at all primaries and main elections. Call or write his or her office to let them know that you support what they're doing. Unfortunately, too few Christians communicate directly with those elected to represent them. Politicians are constantly making decisions that will affect your city, state and country in a well written letter or email can have. More impact than you can imagine. Third, once you have become active as an individual, it may be time to leave community change. Yes, you gather others who believe as you do, and start a local group in your community. Effective change most often comes through well-organized and well-led groups that represent a body of the electorate. Finally, pray become active in praying for leaders and officials at all levels as instructed in first Timothy two versus one through four. Pray for elected officials issues, court cases and potential candidates. There is power in prayer. As a founding father, John Hancock wisely challenged Christian citizens in his day. I urge you, by all that is dear, by all that is honorable, by all that is sacred. Not only that you pray, but that you act. Do all four of these action steps and you can shape the future of your city, state and nation. It's time to put your influence to work through election season and beyond. 

Tim Barton [00:25:42] A big election is approaching and some major decisions are about to be made. Voting is one of our most important rights and responsibilities as US citizens, and this next election will ultimately determine who makes the calls and all the issues that you and I care the most about in this upcoming election. Your voice and your vote counts. 

David Barton [00:25:58] The president who takes office will have the opportunity to make some major decisions this term that will impact generations to come. The one third of the Senate we vote in office. This election will determine just how far that next president can go in making those decisions. And all the House of Representatives seats will be up for grabs. So this is a year to show up and vote your values. 

Tim Barton [00:26:20] We have a chance to shape history one vote at a time. 

Rick Green [00:26:25] Out of time for today, folks. You can get today's program at our website, WallBuilders.Show. Also, yesterday's election special is available at our website WallBuilders.show. Share those with your friends and family. Let's get as many Christians as possible to be good stewards using their voice and their vote. Thanks so much for listening to The WallBuilders Show.