If you know how the number of electors per state is calculated, then you know the answer (3). Remember: each state is entitled to, at the very least, 3 electors. Why? Because the number of electors per state is equal to the number of senators per state + the number of house members. How many senators does CA have? 2. How about ME? 2. Every state, no matter how big or how small, has 2 senators. Period. The only variable in this equation is the number of house members. Remember: the number of house members is calculated based off of population relative to every other state. That said, the absolute lowest number of house members you can possibly have is 1. See, e.g., Alaska. Thus, the lowest number of electors a state can possibly have is 3.

This is a trick question. A presidential candidate (PC) doesn’t win, well, anything based off of popular vote. The PC wins the office if and only if that PC obtains a majority in the Electoral College (EC). In fact, there have been a few times where a PC won the popular vote and lost the election! Take, for example, the election of 1888 (Grover Cleveland v. Benjamin Harrison). Cleveland wins the popular vote, but loses to Harrison in the Electoral College. How is this possible?! Well, it’s a relatively weird function of our voting system.

 Let’s pretend that every state uses a “winner-take-all” Electoral College system. In other words, if a candidate wins the vote percentage in that state, that candidate wins ALL of the electors (let’s say 10) rather than a percentage based off of the number of votes received. So: Candidate 1: 40% of the votes; Candidate 2: 60% of the votes. Candidate 2 gets all 10 electors, even though she didn’t win 100% of the vote. Now let’s switch that. Pretend that we have a proportional system. So, same percentages, but: Candidate 1: 4 electors; candidate 2: 6 electors. Do you see the difference?

Now, pretend every state uses winner-take-all. Assume further that all of the smallest states vote 100% in opposition to Candidate X, and all of the biggest states vote 50.1% FOR candidate X, and 49.9% in opposition. Let’s go a little further. Pretend there are 10 states; 5 tiny (three EC votes each) and 5 massive (20 EC votes each). That’s a total of 115 EC votes, so any candidate must get 58 (rounding up) to win. Each tiny state has 100 people in it, for 500 people total. Each massive state has 1,000 people in it, for 5,000 people total. Assume that everyone is of voting age, and that everyone votes, giving us a grand total of 5,500 voting.  

Now, tally the popular votes. Votes FOR candidate X: 2,505 (.501 * 5000). Votes AGAINST candidate X: 2,995 [(.499 * 5000) + 500]. X loses the popular vote by a pretty hefty margin (over 400 votes).

Now, look at the EC. Votes FOR candidate X: 100 votes (bare majority of every massive state, so (20 * 5)). Votes AGAINST candidate X: 15 (all tiny states, so (5 * 3)).

X gets DESTROYED in the popular vote, but sweeps the EC and wins the presidency. Pretty crazy, right?

This is a straightforward question. If no one candidate receives an absolute majority in the Electoral College, the top three contenders are tossed into the House of Representatives, who will then vote on the candidates. This, of course, became the sore subject of the 1824 “corrupt bargain” election—Jackson wins the popular vote, gets a plurality in the Electoral College, and then loses in the House due to political machinations.

This is the flipside of question 7. Primary is the correct answer. Remember: primaries are procedurally virtually indistinguishable from any other election; participants cast secret ballots for the candidates of their choice. Primaries, as distinguished from caucuses, are a little less grass-roots, and are generally much quicker. Their efficiency likely is one of the reason that primaries are now more popular than caucuses for determining presidential nominees.

The correct choice is “open primary.” Open primaries are extremely interesting in that absolutely anyone, regardless of party affiliation, can vote in them. Because anyone (of any party) can vote for anyone (of any party), this means that people can vote across party lines. This allows for political machinations that are extraordinarily cunning.

Take, for example, a nomination fight involving Republicans and Democrats. Both parties are fronting candidates that would pose a significant challenge to the other (meaning it wouldn’t be a landslide either way). That said, both parties have a back-burner candidate who is a political liability, and would lose to the opposing candidate if nominated in the primary. A particularly smart campaign would organize a cross-vote, whereby voters of one party (say Republicans) vote for the weaker DEMOCRAT in order to get that candidate nominated in the hopes that their own candidate would win in the general election.

Don’t believe me? Look up the “Anyone but Cynthia” campaign—it involves a GA congresswoman.

This is the reverse of the previous question. Not every primary is “open;” many of them are “closed.” Closed primaries, much as the name suggests, are closed off from anyone who is not a registered party member. The advantages of closed primaries are legion: there can be no cross-voting, voting tends to be more cohesive and less scattered, etc. The disadvantages of closed primaries are also significant, however, grass-roots voting at this particular level tends to bring out the most extreme and the least representative of the party.

In both open primaries, and closed primaries, the top candidates are selected from two different political parties. General elections are not “before the general election,” and referendums have to do with issues and not office holders. "Blanket primary" is the correct answer because such primaries occur before the general election, deal with electing candidates, and the candidates do not have to be from different political parties.

This is a relatively interesting subtopic of presidential politics. Presidents are allowed to fund up to a certain amount of their campaign by using public funds (they are set aside/budgeted). If, however, they decide to use public funds, they must agree to an overall cap on the amount of money that they will expend, and they cannot accept any private donations. In other words, if the President opts-in, his campaign will be capped at a certain amount, and he may not solicit donations.

As prescribed by the U.S. Constitution each state appoints Presidential Electors who cast ballots for the candidate who they are pledged to. Each state has the same number of Presidential Electors as it has Congressional representation (the number U.S. representatives plus two for the two U.S. senators). Parties choose their Electors who are pledged to vote for a certain candidate and if that candidate wins the state then those Electors become the official Electors for the state. Most states have laws that force the Electors to vote for their pledged candidate in order to ensure that they don’t go rogue.

It is a commonly held belief that the American people elect the President and Vice President directly. In reality, it is the Electoral College that has the final vote and elects the Executive. In the early days of our government, it was believed that most of the voters were not educated sufficiently to vote for a good candidate for President and would vote for the individual whose promises were pleasing to them. Thus, the Electoral College was created. The people would vote, as we do today, then their votes would be taken by messenger to the Electoral College where individuals selected for their knowledge and impartiality would count the votes. Then, as today, each state had a selected number of representatives in the Electoral College. In the early days, these representatives would vote for the candidate that they felt was best suited to be President and Vice President regardless of the people’s vote. Today, representatives in the College are selected by the political parties and when we cast our votes, we are voting for them. They in turn will cast their votes according to the laws of their state and the vote of the people.