On this day in 1789, the first presidential electors are selected. Just a few weeks later, the Electoral College would elect George Washington as the nation’s first President. Perhaps you know that Washington’s election was unanimous, but do you know about the unusual decisions made by state legislatures that year? The states engaged in independent decision-making that seems strange to modern Americans. The founding generation, however, knew that it was all part and parcel of

On this day in 2000, an American presidential election ends in uncharacteristic uncertainty. Who would be President-elect, George W. Bush or Al Gore? More than a month of legal wrangling would follow . But did you ever think about this? The uncertainty could have been avoided if roughly 8,000 people had stayed in their voting lines. They didn’t, though. They listened to the media, got discouraged, and went home. Why did so many people fail to vote, when they’d intended to? Th

Congress’s timeline for presidential elections is actively dangerous. The nation hovered near the edge of crisis in late December and...

On this day in 1860, Abraham Lincoln is elected President of the United States. Such an achievement must have seemed impossible during...