To the editor:

A letter I wrote last month prompted a fairly long debate about the purpose and utility of the Electoral College. I argued that it emanated from the drafters’ distrust of pure democracy and their desire to put a final check in place that would allow the best of us to protect us from ourselves. I think that position is well supported by the documentary record.

In Federalist Paper No. 68, concerning the Electoral College, Alexander Hamilton wrote:

“It is equally desirable that the immediate election should be made by men most capable of analyzing the qualities adapted to the station, and acting under circumstances favorable to deliberation, and to a judicious combination of all the reasons and inducements which were proper to govern their choice.”

As the fingerprints of Russian espionage on our presidential election become more and more clear, the wisdom of the constitutional choice of insulating the presidency from obvious foreign influence becomes more apparent. Apart from objections to Mr. Trump’s character and temperament, the direct influence of an antagonistic foreign government should be enough to make the electors balk at conferring the presidency upon him. If now is not a time for the electors to exercise their power, when?