From our favorite Earth-Bound Misfit:
Between the way that electors are assigned and the fact that slaves were counted as 3/5ths persons for the purposes of the Census from 1790 through 1860, the Electoral College gave outsiszed representation to slave-holding states when it came time to choose presidents. The slave-holding states were concerned that if the President was elected by a majority vote, the more populous northern states would vote in a president dedicated to the abolition of slavery.
It happened anyway. But instead of a negotiated phase-out, with compensation of some sort to those owning slaves, emancipation was achieved at the point of a gun. Lots of guns. Over 600,000 people were killed (almost all young men) and the slave-holding regions were economically devastated for almost a century.
But the Electoral College survives.
Now, we are seeing an attempt by the bitter dead-ender elements of the losing party of the 2020 presidential election to use the Electoral College to, in effect, stage a coup.