Let's just cut to the chase…the way in which we select our President is going to destroy this country.
The popular vote, which is a direct result of the influence of democratic thinking in American culture, will be the end of this nation as it was founded. The United States is going to end in civil war one of these days, mark those works. Inevitable civil war is exactly why the nation was not designed to select a President the way we are doing it right now and it sure as heck is the reason why they rejected any semblance of a nationwide popular vote. We too frequently act like our system "just is what it is" as if there isn't a point behind the way it is set up…and that is simply wrong. There is a reason why the founders selected the mode of presidential election that they did. They direly wanted to tamp down the volatile influence of democracy (and of course they wanted to end the monarchial system of divine right to rule as well).
Do you understand how badly they wanted to avoid democratic rule? Stop and think about the impression you commonly have been given in public schools and in the news media regarding the intention of Constitutional government. The fact of that matter is that the whole system is set up in opposition to democracy, yet do you get that impression today? Are we not told that "our democracy" is the most sacrosanct facet of the American heritage? It's just not true, this was never intended to be a democracy. The American patriots were anything but ambivalent about the democratic election of the President. They were aware of the appeal of democracy and categorically rejected it.
Their intention to avoid electing Presidents by way of popular vote really is common sense. Every time you ask people to vote you are asking them to divide themselves up and pick sides. In order to be sure you get a majority vote you need to demonize the opposition in such a way that at least 51% of the population is so appalled by the other side that they will want nothing to do with them. You need to fire people up and motivate them with the desire to win. You must make it clear to them that if the other side wins, they will lose. You must convince them that those others must be "defeated". You must convince them that the whole nation is in peril if the other side wins. Hate and fear are tremendous motivators and they win elections...they also justify the escalations leading to violence.
A nation can only pit its people against each other like that for so long, sooner or later things will overheat and then melt down. Read President Washington's Farewell Address and look at how earnestly he pleaded with the people (and future American generations) to avoid "factions" at all costs...he knew our day would come otherwise.
Perhaps as we look back with 20/20 hindsight, we can identify a few flaws in their foresight, which they expected and allowed an amendment process to exist for future generations to fix such oversights. I would argue that they should have been much clearer as to how the electoral college should work. The choice of President ought not involve a popular vote at all…ever. Not even at the State level. There should be no national campaigns because there should simply be no need for such a thing.
State legislatures ought to appoint Electors to the Electoral College and those Electors ought to caste their votes for the POTUS independently from those legislatures and independently from direct public pressure. They ought to be selected by the legislature, but not controlled by them much in the same way as judges are selected but independent and not a controlled body. They ought to only serve once with new electors being installed every four years. If the people are upset by who their state legislatures have appointed to the Electoral College, they can of course either recall those legistlators or vote them out at the next election. This would provide some accountability to the people for who is elected President…but not directly. This isn't, never was and never should be a democracy. We must get back to electing Presidents the way the Founders intended. If we don't, we will start shooting at one another someday. Civil War will be inevitable if we don't stop it, the Founders had enough sense to recognize that and set us on a different course.
The Bible does not prescribe a way to recognize national leaders, it just says that we are to be submissive to them so long as they remain His servant. However, there can be little doubt that God intends for a nation to remain unified, not hatefully divided. Anything that fans the flames sectarianism, tribalism and balkanization will inevitably lead to civil war. It is just human nature to allow things to go that way, so as Christians we ought to strongly oppose any form of government which pits American's against one another in vitriolic ways. Our current system does that, that's not even debatable. People will always oppose each other philosophically, we do not need a system which exacerbates, inflames and weaponizes those differences…and the way we elect Presidents does just that.
