The Twelfth Amendment

Ratified in 1804 after the chaotic election of 1800, the Twelfth Amendment requires electors in the Electoral College to cast separate ballots for President and Vice President. It is the operating manual for modern presidential elections.

The original Constitution gave each presidential elector two votes, with no distinction between the votes for President and Vice President. The candidate with the most votes became President. The runner-up became Vice President. The system worked tolerably well in 1788 and 1792, when George Washington was the obvious choice. It broke down quickly thereafter. In 1796, Federalist John Adams won the presidency, while his Democratic-Republican opponent Thomas Jefferson became Vice President. The two men disagreed on nearly everything. In 1800, the system collapsed entirely. Jefferson and his running mate Aaron Burr received identical electoral vote counts. The election went to the House of Representatives, which deadlocked through 35 ballots before finally selecting Jefferson. The Twelfth Amendment, ratified in 1804, fixed the design flaw. Electors now cast one ballot for President and a separate ballot for Vice President. If no candidate receives a majority of electoral votes for President, the House chooses among the top three candidates, with each state delegation casting a single vote. If no candidate receives a majority for Vice President, the Senate chooses between the top two. The amendment also requires that the President and Vice President not both be inhabitants of the same state as the elector, a vestigial provision that has shaped a few modern campaigns. The Twelfth Amendment has governed every presidential election since 1804. The House has chosen the President only once under it, in 1825, when no candidate reached a majority and the House selected John Quincy Adams over Andrew Jackson.