ection of the constitution and the
practice under it, says:

Under this authority, the appointment of electors has been
variously provided for by the State legislatures. In some States
the legislatures have directly chosen the electors by themselves;
in others they have been chosen by the people by a general ticket
throughout the whole State, and in others by the people in
electoral districts fixed by the legislature, a certain number of
electors being apportioned to each district. No question has ever
arisen as to the constitutionality of either mode, except that of
a direct choice by the legislature. But this, though often
doubted by able and ingenious minds, has been firmly established
in practice ever since the adoption of the constitution, and does
not now seem to admit of controversy, even if a suitable tribunal
existed to adjudicate upon it.--[2 Story on Constitution, section
1,472.

Judge Strong, one of the justices of the Supreme Court of the
United States, and a member of the electoral commission, in
discussing the subject of this section, says:

I doubt whether they [the framers of the national constitution]
had in mind at all [in adopting this section] the idea of a
popular election as a mode of appointing State electors. They
used the word _appoint_, doubtless thinking that the legislatures
of the States would themselves select the electors, or empower
the governor or some other State officer to select them. The word
appoint is not the most appropriate word for describing the
result of a popular election. Such a mode of appointment, I
submit is allowable, but there is little reason to think it was
contemplated. * * * It was not until years afterward that the
electors were chosen by vote.--[Electoral Commission, p. 252.

Senator Frelinghuysen, also a member of the Electoral Commission,
thus speaks of the practice in the several States:

Under this power [the power given by the section of the national
constitution, which we are now considering] the legislature might
direct that the electors should be appointed by the legislature,
by the executive, by the judiciary, or by the people. In the
earliest days of the republic, electors were appointed by the
legislatures. In Pennsylvania they were appointed by the
judiciary. Now, in all the States except