IIRC, on my autumn vacation through Virginia and Maryland, it was emphasized at least a half-dozen times that the electoral college was set up as a compromise to prevent the direct rule of the mob. (Why historical interpreters would want to emphasize this to groups largely composed of foreigners is beyond me). The two-party system has perverted this somewhat; any EC model should work best in a multi-party system, where smaller parties can work together to elect the more or most favourable slate.
Perhaps that's a good reason for instituting proportional representation in the United States; an institution well-suited to it already exists.
In any case, I don't believe that abolition of slavery became a big political concern for another fifty to seventy-five years. But I could, and often am, wrong.
Cheers,
Marco
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> | We know what causes violence: poverty, <
> Marco Anglesio | discrimination, the failure of the <
> mpa at the-wire.com | educational system. It's not the genes <
> http://www.the-wire.com/~mpa | that cause violence in our society. <
> | --Paul Billings <
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