Posted on 08/11/2004 5:42:04 AM PDT by Mike Bates
What I would suggest is that we expand the House, and the state legislatures, and make smaller districts with fewer constituitents per Representative.
It's been awhile (perhaps too long) since I read the Federalist Papers, but one of the notions underlying the system of government was that as long as different factions were fighting with each other to maintain their own powers, liberty would be safe. The danger would be if any particular faction was too successful in concentrating power unto itself.
If you were a state legislator, would you support a Senator who threatened to withhold highway funds from states that didn't impose a 0.08 BAC level? Or would you see such a move as a threat to your own personal power, even if your state happened to have a BAC of 0.08 already?
One of the major principles of federalism is that different people in different places get to live under different laws. If 67% of the people in 67% of the states want to live under a certain law, but only 33% of the people in the other states wants to, should everyone have to live under that law?
As I've drawn up the numbers, 56% of the people want such a law. So imposing it nationwide would make 56% of the people happy. On the other hand, if the law were imposed only in those states that wanted it, 67% of the people would be happy. So which is a better solution?
If people elect Senators directly, it's likely that 67% of the Senators will support imposing the law nationwide. If legislators elect Senators, however, it's much more likely that the legislators in states where such a law is desired would impose the law themselves and not pressure their Senator to do so. After all, they've given their people what they want without involving the Senate, and thus avoid giving away any power they don't have to.
I remember once upon a time on some discussion board (I think it was pre-FR) someone suggested the idea of having the public vote on the Fed interest rate. Everyone casts a ballot and the rate would be set to the average of all the votes.
Clearly a bad idea in that most people have no clue about how the rate should be set, but also because using an average would encourage people to vote higher or lower than what they really wanted to "steer" the rate to the right value. For example, suppose you wanted the rate to be 4.0, and you were allowed to vote for any number 0.0 to 10.0. If others' votes average 4.5, you should vote for 0.0; if others' votes average 3.5, you should vote for 10.0. Only if others' votes average exactly 4.0 should you yourself vote for 4.0.
An improvement to this system, which overcomes the problem of encouraging people to "exaggerate" their vote (but does not, unfortunately, solve the problem of public cluelessness) would be to set the rate to the median voted-upon value, rather than the average. In this way, everyone who votes above the median gets the same 'weight' of vote as everyone who votes below the median.
In a way, I see the difference between a direct overall plebeiscite versus a multi-level indirect system as being somewhat analagous to the difference between the 'average' Fed-rate vote versus the 'median' one.
Suppose 100% of the people in NYC, Los Angeles, Chicago, and a few other cities comprising 51% of the US population want to live under a certain law, and 0% of the population elsewhere does. Which is a 'fairer' approach:
That is exactly my point. With the current system of popular vote the urban center of a state is represented and the rural areas are not. Rural areas carry the industrial, agricultural, mining and recreational load yet it is city dwellers who call the tune. They know nothing (and care nothing) about the concerns of people and businesses there.
They control those activities for their own perceived benefit imposing environmental regs, zoning regs and other laws that benefit or are thought to benefit the city dweller. It put enormous pressures on rural citizens and businesses. The very people and businesses that produce the essential materials for living.
On the other side of the coin the rural folks have no say in what happens in the cities which often overflows in effect into rural life.
That's not a balanced approach to the states interests as a whole that's a one sided, winner-takes-all approach. Cumulative is just another word for "will of the majority" which is not what the founders had in mind. We were a republic not a democracy. We had a "rule of law" not two wolves and a sheep voting on what's for dinner.
Never. What I argue for is a return to the wisdom of the original intent and structure of the Constitution.
... Go draw the new map.
I won't need to. If easterners continue to squeeze the west and the south for all they can get, selfishly disregarding their concerns, the people there will (and have before) pick up their guns and fight back. The map will be redrawn, not into smaller states, but into NE, South, West, SW, NW and Southern CA. I'm sure you have no idea just how fed up westerners are. Just how fractured this country is.
And the concerns of urban centers lend themselves well to the centralisation of power on the Federal level. Redistribution of wealth. Gun control. Abortion on demand. Acceptance of an activist judiciary in general. Federal control of everything from education to the social policies of drug enforcement. From highways and other infra-structure projects to health care oversight.
The states lose power and the residents lose their voice on the local level.
By doing so, it made the Senate redundant, since the state's electorate already elected their representatives in the House. The Senate was supposed to be a different, more deliberative body, by NOT being elected by the whims of the people.
-PJ
Thanks Mike...
Independent polls in 30 days or so will be the track to watch...
And don't forget about the Senate's advise and consent responsibilities. The Senate is responsible for confirming Executive appointments.
-PJ
Great stuff here...
Furthermore, would a Senator appointed by states even support having the funds leave the state in the first place? Why can't the state just improve the roads on their own? Why should the money flow to Washington, only to be doled back with strings attached?
-PJ
It does sound similar. Original intent was wrapped around the filtering, slowing effect of representative government as opposed to majority will government. The representative model provides one strong voice for a pocket of people competing against an equal voice for other groups of people. It cools debate and requires reasoned compromises to achieve a consensus. Majority will is an immediate imposition of the rule of the most popular opinion of the moment. It is much more open to emotional labilities and closed to reason.
True. Which directly effects the balance of fed authority over states authority. The executive presiding over federal enforcement through the U.S. Attorney General and judicial offices who exert power over states through federal courts.
As it is Senators have more loyalty to the federal government than their own state and act accordingly.
Thanks so much.
Actually, as it is, Senators have more loyalty to their party than to the federal government.
As was pointed out earlier in the thread, the national party is responsible for funding all the Senate races, which is why you would have the Senator from New York fundraising in California, for instance. Senate elections are 33 of the most expensive elections that occur every two years. If you eliminate the popular election of Senators, you eliminate the need for this fundraising.
Now, House races are amongst such small electorates that it doesn't make sense to raise large sums of money, or have a national party organization to coordinate funding across all 435 congressional districts. Therefore, with the elimination of a directly elected Senate, that leaves only the office of the President to raise national campaign funds. Without the noise of the Senate elections, can the national parties justify their activities solely for the presidential campaigns?
I don't think so. Therefore, eliminating direct election of Senators would be the elegant campaign finance reform.
-PJ
Exactly!
(Walks away from thread to campaign for the Bull Moose party.)
Only if you equate "power of individual states" with state legislatures.
That is nonsense. Federalism has little or nothing to do with the method of Senatorial selection to the National body. Apparently you are not clear on the meaning of federalism.
Nor is it true that non-state residents were not appointed by legislatures to the Senate.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.