To the Editor:

Thank you for publishing The Smoky Mountain News. We enjoy reading it every week. I would like to raise a few points regarding your opinion column in the Nov. 16 edition (www.smokymountainnews.com/opinion/item/18818). 

First, remember the Electoral College issue only affects the presidential election. The branch of government the founding fathers intended to be the most crucial was the Congress, and of course we have large state/small state balance in the two-house structure. The executive branch was designed primarily to simply execute the laws passed by Congress. 

If the president’s power was limited to the level spelled out in the Constitution, the presidential elections would be far less criticaI. I believe it is fair to say all of the founding fathers were very worried about the presidency becoming too powerful. 

I refer you to the book recently reviewed by one of your book reviewers: Nine Presidents Who Screwed Up America: and Four Who Tried to Save Her. All Americans should support measures to reduce presidential power.

Second, my thoughts regarding the recent election results were similar to those in your piece until I listened to Rush Limbaugh’s programs over the past few days (sorry to refer to him. I’m sure you are not a proponent of his views but I believe these are valid points). He correctly pointed out that if the presidential race was based on popular vote both candidates would have campaigned much differently. Trump did not campaign in very blue states and Clinton did not campaign in red states. 

What would the outcome be if they did? We know that in states where they did both campaign Trump was more successful. And if the popular vote was the basis of the election, it would certainly result in more blue state Republicans and red state Democrats going to the polls. So the popular vote might have favored Trump if that was the format. 

I support the Electoral College format for the presidential elections and am certainly glad we live in a republic, not a democracy. Thanks for the opportunity to respond to your editorial.

John Johnson

Lake Junaluska