According to documents A and D, however, show that the United States' method of choosing the president doesn't reflect the population accurately at all. A state such as Illinois, which has a higher population than twelve other states combined, still has less than half the representation in the Electoral College than those other twelve states put together. When it should be that the states each only receive as much power as their populations indicate (the democratic principle taking precedent over the federalist principle), the state government are empowered by the Electoral College, and the political beliefs of citizens of Illinois are undermined in the name of states' rights (the federalist principle taking precedent over the democratic principle). This dichotomy between the population in a state and representation in the Electoral College not only proves ineffective in supporting democracy in America, but assumes that the division of government by the federalist principle should be relied on to reflect the views of the people more than the views of the people.
Even when the popular vote, where the citizens of the nation directly express their preferences for candidates to hold presidential office, indicates one thing (the democratic principle), the Electoral College could easily prove to support federalism more than democracy. One of the avenues of expression and attempts at policy change that the democratic principle supports is the flexibility to allow a third candidate to run for presidential office. This third candidate would be able to show moderation between the two major parties. 19 million citizens out of a total of 103 million (roughly 18 percent) voted for the third candidate, Ross Perot, in the 1992 presidential election. The Electoral College, however, didn't allow even one vote to Perot.
