Do you long for the day when the common man was cut out of the electoral process?
1. What do you mean by "common man"? All Americans should participate in the electoral process. "One man, one vote", unless you decide not to exercise that right.
2. Election of US Senators by the state legislatures was written into The Constitution from the very beginning. It was only after certain parties decided that the sheeple were more easily fooled did they make an end-run around the legislatures. Look at the circus of Senators that has resulted. Who do you think is responsible for the vast majority of pork barrel (earmarked) projects?
3. If the "common man" were smart, he'd pay more attention to local city and state elections. Remember the saying, "All politics are local."
The common man has little to do with today's government. But it used to be that the Senate allowed state governments to have a certain amount of "veto power" over the federal government. I don't think a state-legislature-appointed Senate would have been too happy about the federal government trying to take away the state legislatures' power.