Some states reasoned that the favorite presidential candidate among the people in their state would have a much better chance if all of the electors selected by their state were sure to vote the same way – a "general ticket" of electors pledged to a party candidate.[31] So the slate of electors chosen by the state were no longer free agents, independent thinkers, or deliberative representatives. They became "voluntary party lackeys and intellectual non-entities."[32] Once one state took that strategy, the others felt compelled to follow suit in order to compete for the strongest influence on the election.[31]
When James Madison and Hamilton, two of the most important architects of the Electoral College, saw this strategy being taken by some states, they protested strongly. Madison and Hamilton both made it clear this approach violated the spirit of the Constitution. According to Hamilton, the selection of the president should be "made by men most capable of analyzing the qualities adapted to the station [of president]."[29] According to Hamilton, the electors were to analyze the list of potential presidents and select the best one. He also used the term "deliberate." Hamilton considered a pre-pledged elector to violate the spirit of Article II of the Constitution insofar as such electors could make no "analysis" or "deliberate" concerning the candidates. Madison agreed entirely, saying that when the Constitution was written, all of its authors assumed individual electors would be elected in their districts and it was inconceivable a "general ticket" of electors dictated by a state would supplant the concept. Madison wrote to George Hay,
The district mode was mostly, if not exclusively in view when the Constitution was framed and adopted; & was exchanged for the general ticket [many years later].[33]
The founders assumed that electors would be elected by the citizens of their district and that elector was to be free to analyze and deliberate regarding who is best suited to be president.
Madison and Hamilton were so upset by what they saw as a distortion of the framers’ original intent that they advocated for a constitutional amendment to prevent anything other than the district plan: "the election of Presidential Electors by districts, is an amendment very proper to be brought forward", Madison told George Hay in 1823.[33] Hamilton went further. He actually drafted an amendment to the Constitution mandating the district plan for selecting electors