There are 538 electors in the Electoral College with each state getting same number of electors as representatives they have in Congress. The way they are selected is different for each state, but mainly they chosen by political parties. The electors meet in each state on the first Monday after the second Wednesday in December. A majority of 270 electoral votes is required to elect the President and Vice President. No Constitutional provision or Federal Law requires electors to vote in accordance with the popular vote in their state. Some states do have laws requiring electors to vote in accordance with the popular vote of the state and if they do not they can be fined and have their vote not counted and a substitute elector will vote for them. If no president wins the majority of the electoral votes, the 12th Amendment to the Constitution states the presidential election is to be decided by the House of Representatives. The house would select the president by a majority vote of the top three candidates. The votes are then counted by the president of the senate and then they are official. Objections are then taken with at least one member of the house and senate signing it. Then each house reviews the objections. The President is not selected by the people of the United States but by electors who may or may not represent the people of the United States.
The Electoral College violates a right of self-governance, a right this nation was built on. This violation makes the Electoral College unfair. The founders of this country wanted to protect the government from getting an unqualified president that the uneducated masses in this country might vote for. This was fine in an age of slow movement of information and many uneducated people, but now this protection is just no longer needed. People now have television, radio, and current newspapers. The American people now are smart enough to handle a direct election of the president making this electoral protection obsolete.
