On 6 November 2012, Barack Obama and Joe Biden were re-elected President and Vice President of the United States. Or were they? As we all learned in our high school government class, the President and Vice President are officially elected by the Electoral College. Under this system, established by Article II and the 12th Amendment to the United States Constitution, voters in each state on Election Day are actually choosing a candidate’s slate of electors to serve in the Electoral College. Under Chapter 1 of Title 3, United States Code (62 Stat. 672, as amended), the Electoral College meets and votes on the first Monday after the second Wednesday in December. The 2012 Electoral College will meet on 17 December to cast Virginia’s 13 electoral votes for Obama and Biden.
The Library of Virginia has a variety of records in several collections (Secretary of the Commonwealth, Office of the Governor, Virginia General Assembly, etc.) related to the Virginia Electoral College from 1789 to 2008. Today, copies of the Certificate of Ascertainment and Certificate of Vote are transferred to the Library by the Virginia State Board of Elections. The Certificate of Ascertainment lists the names of the electors appointed and the number of votes cast for each person during the general election. The Certificate of Vote lists the totals for the Electoral College. Additional records related to the 2008 Virginia Electoral College are included in the Governor Tim Kaine Administration Web Archive Collection. You can read Governor Tim Kaine’s address to the 2008 Electoral College and view photographs of the event.
-Roger Christman, Senior State Records Archivist
*Original post slightly edited for clarity
