The Tyranny of the Superminority

[Boatbum]

I would say that the government should represent human beings, not states. There is no conceivable reason that a voter in Vermont should have 42X the representation in the Senate as a voter in Texas.

However, since any constitutional amendment requires a 2/3 majority in the Senate and a 3/4 majority of states, it's more likely that I'll ride to work next week on a sparkly p0ink unicorn than that I'll ever see it changed.

Then why even have states? Why should a tiny state like Rhode Island or Delaware be allowed to exist? Why should California (which represents a majority of our west) coast be a single state? Why not just divide the US into 8 or 10 geographically reasonable administrative regions (regardless of current state boundaries) and be done with it. It certainly has been discussed from time to time.

[Keith Wilson]

History, tradition, inertia. Sure, if we were starting from scratch, that might make sense. It ain't gonna happen.

Just for amusement, here we have one way to make 50 equal-population states.

[Peerie Maa]

Then why even have states? Why should a tiny state like Rhode Island or Delaware be allowed to exist? Why should California (which represents a majority of our west) coast be a single state? Why not just divide the US into 8 or 10 geographically reasonable administrative regions (regardless of current state boundaries) and be done with it. It certainly has been discussed from time to time.

But ,but, but, that would be following a British lead. We redrew our administrative counties in '76 and several Ceremonial Counties ceased to exist.
Can't have the US of A learning from darned furriners.

[Boatbum]

Interesting, but they do not all have equal populations. Los Angeles has 10,170,000 people. Each "state" would need 7.7 million people, AND how would the boundaries change as people move around? Maybe we should not have 50 states, maybe 10 would be OK bout 39 million per state

[Hugh Conway]

I wonder why there’s an asterisk next to LA

It’s not that we can’t learn from furreigners peeriema, it’s that a large portion of the US thinks failure is good. They think the US grows stronger by doing nothing. Amusingly these are usually the people most likely to wrap themselves in the flag.

[oznabrag]

I would say that the government should represent human beings, not states. There is no conceivable reason that a voter in Vermont should have 42X the representation in the Senate as a voter in Texas.

However, since any constitutional amendment requires a 2/3 majority in the Senate and a 3/4 majority of states, it's more likely that I'll ride to work next week on a sparkly p0ink unicorn than that I'll ever see it changed.

I'm sorry, but I like the two Senators per State thing.

For one thing, it ensures that there will always be an even number of votes, and a VP to break any ties.

The real bullspit is the limit of 435 Representatives.

I guess we're too cheap to build a hall big enough to house them all.



Apparently, the average Mexican has three time the representation as the average American, and the average Luxembourger enjoys 75 times the representation that we do.

[Boatbum]

But ,but, but, that would be following a British lead. We redrew our administrative counties in '76 and several Ceremonial Counties ceased to exist.
Can't have the US of A learning from darned furriners.

Sorry to let you know, but dividing the US up has been discussed for decades. I never said it was a "new" concept, or even a strictly American concept. But if you feel a little insecure, I am happy to concede that the British already did this. As I recall the did this in 1915 in the middle east ?

That said it ignores the history of how the USA grew or formed its union.

[Keith Wilson]

I'm not at all convinced that more representatives per voter would help anything at all.

And I'm certainly not endorsing that particular map, or even redrawing state boundaries in general. Honestly, thinking about any of this is only useful as a purely theoretical exercise, since amending the Constitution to reduce the power of small-population states in the Senate is effectively impossible, redrawing state boundaries even more so.

[Boatbum]

I'm not actually advocating its division either. What I was trying to underscore is that it would take redrawing the map for people to reach the point of letting go of their regional individuality. You have to get there before it becomes a one person, one vote situation. I've seen other suggestions on how to do that are much larger and not with such long, gerrymandered boundaries.

[Peerie Maa]

That said it ignores the history of how the USA grew or formed its union.

It can be argued that the US is stuck in the time during which it wrote and ratified its Constitution, and is unable to move on.
You may have been talking about making things better for decades, but have actually achieved what?

[Keith Wilson]

Here's another version. Probably too much thread drift; let's just abolish the filibuster and see how that goes.

[Hugh Conway]

That said it ignores the history of how the USA grew or formed its union.

genocide and war crimes? Do tell us.

[Stiletto]

Here's another version. Probably too much thread drift; let's just abolish the filibuster and see how that goes.

NZ has a Parliamentary system that has electorates that are divided on the same basis as that map. The Electoral Commission is mandated to periodically change the boundaries as necessary to keep the populations of each electorate as close as practically possible.

That system seems to work.

[skuthorp]

Ignore the actual state boundaries for Federal elections for a start. Establish a non-partisan professional Electoral Commission to, on a regular basis, redraw Federal Electoral boundaries to keep the population of voters within an agreed limit. (Australia does it all the time regardless of the political cycle), It works.
After a period of say 10 years extend the Independent Commissions to the states. (as is the norm here).

Of course the trump party won't like it, neither will the Democrat Party, neither actually being democratic and your Constitution is certainly not, as intended.

Ho hum, it's not rocket science, it's just fairness and more or less Democratic in it's operation.

Good luck with that……...