科普｜美国的选举人团是什么？
文摘
2024-11-05 12:54
美国
美国纽约时报网站于2024年11月1日发表题为《所以…选举人团到底是如何运作的？》的文章。以下观点不代表任何译者立场，现将全文翻译如下：
So … How Does the Electoral College Work, Again?It’s weird. It’s confusing. It’s how we elect the president.By Lisa LererI
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llustrations by La Tigre
Nov. 1, 2024
Every four years, there’s one thing everybody is talking about: the Electoral College. It’s not a school, despite what it sounds like. It’s the unique way that the United States elects its presidents. And if we’re honest, it’s pretty confusing. Here’s a breakdown of how that process works.每四年，人们都在谈论同一件事：选举人团。尽管听起来像是一所学校，但它并非如此。这是美国独特的总统选举方式。坦白说，这确实令人困惑。让我们来剖析这个过程是如何运作的。Black-and-white illustration of a hand holding a square card that says vote and has a star above the text.黑白插画，一只手持有一张带有“vote”（投票）字样的方形卡片，字样上方有一颗星星。When your school elects a class president, the math is simple: The kid who gets the most votes wins. The presidential election is more complicated. When people cast their ballots, their votes won’t go straight to Kamala Harris or Donald Trump. Instead, they go through the Electoral College, a system in which people who represent different states elect the president.当学校选举班长时，计算方式很简单：得票最多的学生获胜。但总统选举要复杂得多。选票并不会直接投给卡玛拉·哈里斯或唐纳德·特朗普，相反，这些选票要经过选举人团，在这个体系中，代表不同州的人们选举总统。Illustration of 20 head profiles. Twelve of them are blue and 8 are black. So what is the Electoral College, specifically? It’s a group of hundreds of people called electors who speak for voters in their state. They are usually people involved with politics, like activists or volunteers. You can sort of think of them like team captains who speak for their fellow Pennsylvanians, Coloradans, Wisconsinites and so on. Each state has a different number of electors, and each elector gets one electoral vote.那么，具体来说，什么是选举人团呢？它是由数百名称为选举人的人组成的团体，他们代表各自州的选民发声。这些人通常是政治活动家或志愿者等参与政治的人士。你可以把他们想象成团队队长，分别代表宾夕法尼亚州人、科罗拉多州人、威斯康星州人等等。每个州都有不同数量的选举人，每位选举人拥有一张选举票。An illustration of an all-black map of New York state with the words "New York" spanning the state.纽约州的全黑地图，横跨整个州的是“New York”（纽约）字样。An illustratin of black squares in the shape of New York state.On Election Day, voters like your mom or dad will cast their ballots in their states. Then state officials tally up all the votes.在选举日，选民会在各自的州投票。然后州政府官员会统计所有选票。An illustration of two columns of ballots, one in blue labeled Candidate A and one in black labeled Candidate B.两列选票的插画，一列为蓝色标注为候选人A，另一列为黑色标注为候选人B。An illustration of a pie chart with 60 percent blue and 40 percent black.Here’s where it gets weird: Whichever candidate wins the most votes in your state will get all your state’s Electoral College votes (except in Maine and Nebraska, where they do things differently). So if a candidate gets even just 51 percent of the votes in New York State, they get all of its 28 electoral votes.这里就变得有趣了：在你所在的州获得最多选票的候选人将获得该州所有的选举人团选票（缅因州和内布拉斯加州除外，他们采用不同方式）。所以，如果一位候选人在纽约州仅获得51%的选票，他们就能获得该州全部28张选举人票。An illustrations of blue boxes in the shape of New York state.How many votes does each state get? It depends on its population. States where more people live get more: California has the most, with 54, and Texas has the second-most, with 40. The states with the fewest people, like Alaska and Delaware, have only three. If you add up all the electoral votes in all 50 states (plus Washington, D.C.!), it comes to 538 electoral votes total.每个州获得多少选票？这取决于该州的人口。人口较多的州获得更多选票：加利福尼亚州最多，有54票，德克萨斯州次之，有40票。而阿拉斯加州和特拉华州等人口最少的州只有3票。如果把50个州（再加上华盛顿特区！）的选举人票全部加起来，总数为538票。An illustration of 10 houses in two stacked rows.The Electoral College means that candidates running for president don’t have to worry about the total number of votes they win across the entire country. They just have to win enough states to add up to 270 electoral votes — which is just over half of 538.选举人团制度意味着竞选总统的候选人无需关心他们在全国范围内获得的总票数。他们只需赢得足够多的州，使选举人票达到270票——仅略超过538票的一半即可。An illustration of overlapping daily calendars showing Nov. 5, Dec. 17 and Jan. 6.
重叠的日历页面，显示11月5日（选举日）、12月17日（选举人团投票日）和1月6日（国会认证日）。In almost every state, electors are bound by law to vote for the candidate their state picked. That means that once votes are tallied in each state, we’ll know who won. States will then certify the results, and on Dec. 17, the electors will meet to officially cast their votes. On Jan. 6, Congress will count and confirm the results, and the new president will be inaugurated on Jan. 20.在几乎所有州，选举人都必须依法投票给该州选民选择的候选人。这意味着一旦各州的选票统计完毕，我们就能知道谁获胜了。随后各州将认证结果，12月17日，选举人将召开会议正式投票。1月6日，国会将计票并确认结果，新总统将于1月20日就职。So, uh … why do we do it this way? We have the Electoral College because the men who founded America disagreed over how the new country should elect a president. Some of them thought that only members of Congress should cast the votes. Others thought that everyone in the country should vote for president. And another group worried that states with more people would have too much power in electing the president. So they created the Electoral College as a compromise.那么……为什么美国要采用这种方式呢？之所以有选举人团，是因为美国开国元勋们对新国家应如何选举总统存在分歧。有些人认为只有国会议员才能投票。另一些人则认为全国所有人都应该投票选举总统。还有一群人担心人口较多的州在选举总统时会拥有过大权力。于是他们创立了选举人团作为一种妥协。An illustration of a scroll of paper with lines on it and a feather pen. Not everyone thinks this 237-year-old system is fair. Some think it gives voters in a handful of “swing states” too much power. They believe that the person who receives the most votes from all Americans should win. That doesn’t always happen: In 2016, Hillary Clinton received almost three million more votes than Donald Trump but still lost the election, with only 232 electoral votes. Politicians and activists have proposed changing this system, but so far no one has done it. The Electoral College is still how American democracy works — and how the next president will be elected this November.并非所有人都认为这个已有237年历史的制度是公平的。有些人认为它赋予了少数"摇摆州"选民过大的权力。他们认为获得全美最多选票的人应该获胜。但事实并非总是如此：2016年，希拉里·克林顿虽然比唐纳德·特朗普多获得近300万张选票，但仅获得232张选举人票，最终落选。政治家和活动人士曾提议改革这一制度，但迄今为止无人成功。选举人团仍然是美国民主运作的方式——也将是今年11月选举下一任总统的方式。An illustration of a balance scale with one side holding one person, which is lower than the other side holding three people. 天平插画，一边是一个人（较低），另一边是三个人（较高）。Ready to follow along? Now that you know the lay of the land, print out this Electoral College map and fill it in on election night.准备关注选情了吗？现在你已了解选举全貌，不妨打印一份选举人团地图，在选举之夜填写结果。Instructions: Grab two colored pencils — red for Donald Trump and blue for Kamala Harris. When a candidate wins a state, color it in on the map. Then fill in the same number of squares in the vote counter, column by column. (Note that Maine and Nebraska divide their votes up, so check the news to get those numbers.) The first to cross the centerline, or reach 270 electoral votes, wins.操作说明：准备两支彩色铅笔——红色代表唐纳德·特朗普，蓝色代表卡玛拉·哈里斯。当候选人赢得某个州时，在地图上为该州涂色。然后在计票器上逐列填写相应数量的方格。（注意缅因州和内布拉斯加州的选票是分配的，所以要查看新闻获取具体数字。）首位跨过中线或达到270张选举人票的候选人获胜。
