What happens if the President-Elect dies before the Electoral College meets and votes?

Question

We vote for the Members of the Electoral College in November, and they meet later to elect the President. Now what would happen if the Candidate we elect in November would happen to die before the meeting of the Electors? Are his dedicated electors free to vote for who they wish? Or would they vote for his Running mate? If the President-Elect dies after the Electors meets, then his running mate, the VP-Elect would be sworn in in his place. Or would he? What do you think would happen? How about if he dies after the Electors meet, but before Congress counts the votes?

Answer 1

What the h**l is with all these morbid death questions?  We're all gonna die someday.  We don't know the day or the hour.  All of these looney "predictions" that people are making about McCain AND Obama are unfounded.  Stop with the retarded q's already.

Answer 2

sucks for him!

Answer 3

If the unofficail President elect dies before The Electoral College votes then the Electors would have the power to elect who ever they wanted.  After the Electoral College meets then we have an offical President Elect and the constitution provides that the VP would take over in the event of the death of the President Elect.  

Answer 4

The only time something like this happened was in 1872, when presidential contender Horace Greeley died shortly after the election.  His electoral votes were split among four replacement candidates.  Now Greeley wasn't the winner, so one could hope that the party would have been more organized if he were, but without being able to vote for the candidate (which was ruled unconstitutional in Greeley's case), every elector pledged to him is free to vote for whomever they choose.

Answer 5

Why would Obama die?

This was obviously meant to be funny because the more likely to die first, many would say, is McCain

Answer 6

I dun know