[cheering] thank you for coming. Fortunes above 50 million. You make it that big, pitch in two cents so everyone else has a chance to make it. We are doing the policy release. People here want to know you. They want to know what you are about. As his Vice President , it is my great honor to add his name to the New Hampshire republican primary ballot today because we need New Hampshire and america to give us four more years. [cheers and applause] dr. Lara brown, that is a director of George WashingtonUniversity School of political management, that is a glimpse of the 2020 primary process. A process that attracted more than 20 democrats. Last time around, more than 17 gop candidates vying for the nomination. You have spent your academic career trying to understand and explain the american electoral process. When you try to explain where we are today to people and how this process works, how do you explain it . Dr. Brown the thing you have to start with first is that competitiveness drives a lot of candidates. So, one of the things that is so interesting, when we really understand why there are so many candidates in the democratic primary field, why there are so why there were so many republicans in the 2016 field, it was because the presidency was seen as being up for grabs in both instances. In 2016, it was an open seat. There was this belief that the republicans could win that seat from the democrats. And so, so many republicans jumped in. When we look at 2020, you see that President Trump is something of an embattled incumbent. And that usually also sparks candidates in the Opposition Party to jump in and try to vie for the presidency. When you look across those fields, what should we know about the kinds of people who threw their hats into the ring these days . Dr. Brown since about 1976, our candidates have had more and more individuals who have claimed they are outsiders. First, they began as these outside washington politicians. Governors like jimmy carter, ronald reagan, and bill clinton. Now what we have seen in the last few cycles are individuals like President Trump saying, im not even from the political system at all. In fact, if you look at candidate tom steyers ads, hes running precisely on the same line of donald trumps, that he is a washington outsider and a businessman who can save the system despite having no political experience before joining the system. We thought we would spend this hour with you learning how we got to where we are today by really going through history. The major points in the process where the electoral system has changed. So we have to go back to the beginning. You have written about, starting in the Continental Convention and the debate amongst our Founding Fathers, about the Selection Process for the president. I remember you phrasing it as they were in a circular debate. What is important to know about what they were trying to achieve and what came out of it . Dr. Brown when we look back, we have to realize our framers were trying to do something that was not done around the world. They were trying to figure out how to elect an executive for the country. That was not something that was done all around the world. There were hereditary monarchs in power. And so, as they looked out, they looked to governors of states and really tried to invent their own system. They said, should the congress elect the president . Then they said, no, if they do that, the president will be the creature of congress, meaning that congress will own the presidency. Then they said, should there be a direct popular election . They said, no, that would likely result in sort of any sort of consensus. And there was going to be too much chaos to go with it and in inpracticalities at that moment in time. So they came upon a notion of the Electoral College. What this basically was was a way to say, lets get leaders from each state to go to their state capitals, have a meeting, and for the specific purpose, put forward names, vote on, if you will, two different people who could potentially be president and send them up to congress to determine who was actually the winner. That is really how it started. It started with this idea of, lets get some local leaders to help create some nominees. So, of course, in the past couple decades, the debate has been raging about whether the Electoral College still works for a country of this size, complexity, can you give us the pros and the cons of the Electoral College today . Dr. Brown the biggest thing in its favor is that it does have a tendency to force president ial candidate to campaign broadly and to win different states narrowly. It is more important to win a lot of states by 51 than a couple of states by 60 . What that does is ensures the president , in fact, represents most of the states in addition to most of the people. In other words, the Electoral College really does do what the framers had hoped, which was that it would be an office, the presidency itself, that represented the people, but through their states. So the combination of the house and the senate. The biggest problem with it is actually a problem the parties created themselves, and in fact, is not related to the Electoral College. It is related to how each state allocates its electoral votes. Right now, all states but maine and nebraska allocate those electoral votes in a winner take all manner. Meaning that if you win by 51 , you when all of that states win all of that states electors. A much more fair way would be for there to be essentially proportional representation by the awarding of those electors. So, if one candidate won 51 , 55 , they get 55 of the electors. The other candidate who lost the state would still get 45 of the electors. That would do a better job of more approximating the Overall National popular vote. Is that debate going on in any state legislators today . Dr. Brown sort of. But we actually have is a lot of different Reform Efforts that are attempting to overturn how the Electoral College works. Mostly there is a National Popular vote reform that really argues what should happen is whoever wins the National Popular vote, that states electoral votes should go to that candidate. I cannot envision a scenario where a republican won the National Popular vote and everyone in california would say, yes, isnt it great . All of our electors should go to the republican candidate as well. That is not something i imagine californians would be pleased, to see all 55 electoral votes going to a republican candidate that they clearly did not vote for in the popular vote level. Going back to early history, George Washington by acclamation in two elections, but it became clear the system was not functioning. What happened . Dr. Brown what is so fascinating is that this system almost immediately fell apart. The framers had this solution that the Electoral College either would find a consensus candidate that everyone loved, like George Washington, or that there would essentially be a split decision. Every state would put forward a favorite son. No one would have enough electoral ballast to get a majority, and as a result, the decision stayed among the top five according to the original constitution would go to the house of representatives. Then the house would divide into state delegations and vote for president. What really happened was that parties formed before the 1796 running of the presidency. They formed for a couple reasons. Political science talks about the need for what we Call Coalition in the legislature. Basically government would not be able to operate without parties. What we mean by that is, imagine every piece of legislation. You had to form a brandnew coalition every single time. It just would not form or function. Parties operate is what political scientists call long coalitions. There are groups of people with interests that are generally aligned. They agree to support each other and band together. With that, you are able to address more issues more quickly and efficiently than you would otherwise. These parties really formed in early 1790s because during washingtons administration, there were issues that started to divide people very quickly. You saw the debt assumption bill, a bill where basically washington, d. C. And the federal government would foot all the debts from the revolutionary war. That created some angst among southerners who did not want to see a powerful federal government. Early on there started to be this division between a party that looks at a strong federal government with International Interests and essentially a plan to improve the nation versus a party that is more interested in state and local power, a federal government, and a more inward looking foreign policy. That separated pretty much right away around the 1794, 1793 timeframe. When did the first crisis occur . Dr. Brown the very first competitive election. In 1796 we have a situation where john adams is essentially the federalist nominee and Thomas Jefferson is the democratic nominee at the time, his party was called the democratic republicans. They basically were competing against each other. They each had different favored Vice President ial candidates, but when the balloting happened and every state voted for two people, it turned out john adams came in first and Thomas Jefferson came in second. All of a sudden, you have opposition partisan serving as president and Vice President in the same administration. That clued in everyone there was going to be some problems. The next election, 1800, was essentially a rematch, but now john adams is the incumbent president. Thomas jefferson is working with James Madison, speaker of the house, in the Opposition Party. In that running of the election, Thomas Jefferson is now more popular than the incumbent president , running as this outsider against those in washington, so to speak. You end up having Thomas Jefferson tying the Electoral College with his own Vice President ial pick, aaron burr. At the time, there was no official casting of ballots for president and Vice President as separate ballots by the electors. Aaron burr stayed silent and thought, maybe i can actually be made the president in the house of representatives if i just go along. Maybe i will be able to squeak out the presidency. That created, obviously, a Massive Division in washington over who should become president. On the 36 the ballot in the house of representatives, Thomas Jefferson was made the president of the United States. Clearly six was needed. Dr. Brown that was to amend the constitution, which what it did was force the electors to cast separate ballots. One for president , one for Vice President , and be clear in that. It reduced the overall number of individuals who basically if there were a tie or no one received a majority, would go to the house of representatives. It would do five to three. The next election everyone studied in high school was the 1824 election. Adams, clay, johnson. What is important to know about that . Dr. Brown theres a couple things that are really important to know. Not until James Monroes presidency, this idea of how does the nominee get decided . It really was not a controversy. Everyone understood john adams would be the successor to washington. Everyone understood James Madison would be the successor to Thomas Jefferson. The problem was now you had james monroe, who had been governor in virginia. He had been secretary of state under James Madison. He again becomes president. A lot of other people are starting to say, wait a minute. How come the virginians are consistently getting nominated for this office and winning . By the time munroes presidency is winding down, it is 1824 and competition has been brewing for years. People cannot wait to jump in. They have a lot of candidates and one of those was actually william crawford, who had been secretary of the treasury, if i recall, and crawford gets whats called the king caucus endorsement. The caucus was essentially a meeting of each partys congressional delegation to determine who should be the nominee. It is kind of derogatorily referred to that way because people from outside washington were saying, wait a minute. Congressional members get to elect the chief . We are in a democratic country. You have this sense that the fix is in. Crawford gets this nomination, which might not have been so bad but for the fact that he had a very debilitating stroke and he was partially blind and mostly paralyzed. Yet he still wins the caucus endorsement. The idea that all of a sudden, the presidency is going to somebody who was basically unable to fulfill the duties of the office raised the hackles of many other individuals, including Andrew Jackson, the war hero from the war of 1812 and his battle of new orleans fame, who basically is looking at this as, he is the outsider. He wants to run. Then there is john quincy adams, john son who was now the senator from massachusetts. He is interested. And henry clay, speaker of the house. All of them jump in. All of them start contesting the king caucus endorsement by trying to get basically resolutions from their states and their state legislatures, saying isnt this great . We love our person. This should be the president. The Electoral College again essentially runs into a problem because the ballots are split. What we have is a situation where no one earns a majority of the votes and because it is now the top three, that means it is between john quincy adams, Andrew Jackson, and william crawford. And henry clay, who is speaker of the house, gets to essentially decide. The former candidate who gets ousted, because of the 12 amendment, gets to help make the decision. He makes it in favor of john quincy adams. That becomes the basis of Andrew Jackson and his supporters cry of a corrupt bargain. The whole system again turns into controversy by 1828. Jackson is successful in 1828 and is the president that our current incumbent points to as his favorite in history. How did the election of Andrew Jackson change the system again . Dr. Brown it certainly changed in that Andrew Jackson was from tennessee, he was this war hero, he had a certain celebrity in the country. He also wanted to represent the common man. Interestingly enough, in 1828, he basically picked up William Crawfords campaign manager, who had been Martin Van Buren, who later becomes president. But Martin Van Buren helps Andrew Jackson to expand the basis of the parties. The parties become these mass organizations. By 1832, Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren had decided to adopt an innovation called the national convention, which was a way to bring all the state Party Leaders to one convention to choose the nominees instead of using this either state legislative resolution or a congressional caucus or king caucus. What was happening in the electorate . Who could vote . Dr. Brown generally speaking, what was going on was that white males were now enfranchised. They reduce the property requirements that were in existence early in the republic. It was also true that the states had essentially moved to the system of winner take all in most of the electoral vote allocation. It was also true that states were no longer essentially choosing electors by the state legislature, determining who those were, relying on the votes of the people in their states. The National Conventions, which start in 1830, there were three distinct periods in history of National Conventions. The national Party Leadership, best example five by Abraham Lincolns election. What was the story . Dr. Brown it takes some time for state Party Leaders to actually build up enough credibility to become delegates at their convention. We look to james polks nomination, or Abraham Lincolns. A lot of people who are delegates, managing these candidacies, are the ones ensuring the vote for these individuals, they are in some ways more national Party Leaders than they are state Party Leaders. They are still senators, still representatives. They are sometimes governors, but mor