You Got That Right!
Posted on 12/17/2019 3:57:27 PM PST by Liz
States as states do need representation in the federal government. Under the Constitution, they have far too much.
The confirmation of Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court spurred a lively discussion about institutional design.
After the vote, some noted that the 50 senators who voted to confirm represent about 45 percent of the population.
A number of astute constitutional historians quickly spoke up to point out that of course that happens, because the Senate represents states and not people. If you want to see the people represented, look to the House. But of course, the fact that the Constitution does something isn’t the same as that something being good. We continue to debate the Constitution itself, and specifically the disproportional Senate. If our intuition tells us that there’s something wrong when a minority has that much power, we should pay attention. The Senate’s equal representation of states — not people — should be discussed on its merits.
THE CASE FOR STATES The United States is a federal system. Each state has its own sovereignty and has some authority over its own interests. The relative authority of the state and the national government is contested, but the states retain something.
But since the federal government is so powerful, the states need a way to protect themselves. The Framers’ approach to this sort problem is to let ambition check ambition. The legislature and the president check and balance each other. Similarly, the states are not protected from the federal government by mere parchment barriers. They can defend themselves through their representation in the Senate. These concerns were central for the Framers, who were looking at the Constitution from the very state-centered perspective of the Articles of Confederation. Each state had its own government and identity, and their relationship to one another was weak. The Constitution aimed to make that relationship stronger, but states were still the players. An American was a citizen of their state first, and of the union second.
The case for people---We have come a long way since the founding. Political scientist Daniel J. Hopkins, in his new book, The Increasingly United States, traces how America has gone from “all politics is local” to a world in which national issues dominate even local conflicts. Hopkins devotes an entire chapter to the question of whether people think of themselves as Americans or as citizens of their states.
Across a wide range of measures, he shows that Americans see themselves as Americans first, citizens of their states second. As he puts it: “Compared to their attachment to the nation as a whole, their place-based attachment is markedly weaker. What is more, the content of state-level identities is typically divorced from politics.”
That finding doesn’t mesh well with the idea of people being represented in government through their states. And citizens, politicians and parties have all long realized that. Political strategies for all national offices involve coordination across geography. If you live in a deep red state, you can donate to a candidate running in a purple one. If your district is safe for the Democrats, you can travel to canvass for a candidate in a swing district.
It is illegal for foreign nationals to contribute money to a US electoral campaign. It is neither illegal nor uncommon for citizens to contribute to electoral campaigns in other states. Some candidates receive sizable portions of their resources from out of their own state.
When Americans are hacking the Constitution to get around the geographic nature of our representation, that should be a red flag.
Balancing the representation of states and people Of course, the Constitution does not only allow for the representation of states. The central debate at the constitutional convention was over precisely this balance. Doesn’t the House address that problem?
Yes, but poorly.
For one, because every state must have at least one member in the House, there are still distortions. But even aside from that, single-member districts means we’re still representing territory instead of people. These districts are almost impossible to draw so that the politicians elected reflect the balance of preferences across the entire country.
Right now, that means a bias toward Republicans. Democratic candidates could outpoll Republicans by up to five points and still not be favored to take control of the House. It doesn’t matter whether this is due to conscious gerrymandering or because Democratic voters are concentrated in urban areas. The problem is single-member districts in the first place.
I don’t know of any research to prove it, but I am pretty sure very few Americans think of themselves as first and foremost citizens of their congressional district. Even the president, for whom at least citizens across the country can vote, is elected through the Electoral College, which in turn filters votes through the states.
In short, the supposed balance between state interests and individual citizen interests that the Framers struck isn’t much balance at all. Some Framers observed exactly that at the time. And as the country has evolved, the value of having such strong representation for geography seems to have only waned.
--SNIP--
And while we're at it we can lower the voteing age to 12,give the Supreme Court ultimate authority over the Armed Forces...
Senators do no represent the state anymore. They are voted by the people. Senators SHOULD be appointed by the governor or better yet, state Senators. Then they would have to answer to the state. Such as it is they answer to the biggest donor
Less well known was that many states didn't even have Congressional districts when the nation was first established. House districts didn't become mandatory for all states until the 1820s (I think). Before that, states could apportion their House members however they saw fit ... and many of them simply had at-large House members who represented the entire state. If Connecticut had 10 seats in the House, for example, they would simply hold a vote with dozens of candidates, and the top 10 vote-getters would represent the entire state in the House.
Interestingly, I'd make the case that Congressional districts have made state borders less meaningful than ever. A House district in western Massachusetts, for example, is likely to be represented by a Congressman who is far more similar to his neighboring Congressman in upstate New York than to the nitwits who represent the districts around Boston. In this sense, the U.S. Senate is even more critical now than ever before because it's the only representation people have that binds them to the other people in their own states.
I don’t consider myself a state citizen first because I am free to move around the country. I do however try to avoid entrenched blue states. While I am a resident of a particular state, I do make efforts to participate in the political process. I discovered the importance of that when a nearby city of 100K produced only 3K (three!) Voters during an election. Those voters passed some bad legislation for that city. 97 thousand people were stuck with the bad decisions made by a few.
The problem is that the people are supposed to be represented by their representatives, but they aren’t. The reps vote according to their own political ideologies rather than the desires of the people. A once per year around election time town hall doesn’t cut it. But then, it’s also difficult to get the town’s folk to sit in on a city counsil meeting. Therefore, the other half of the political equation is...We, the people.
Absolutely agree! That damned Wilson and his friggin’ 17th Ammendment!
Another leftest whining about the way they think things SHOULD work, rather than the way the law says that it does.
Cry baby, cry...
We would never have had a Constitution, and thus a united country, but for the Great Compromise. Some states (the smaller ones) wanted 1 legislative body, with representation being 1 vote per state. The larger states wanted one house with strictly proportional (based on population) voting. Both would have adversely affected the other group of states, so the Great Compromise was to give us BOTH. So each state (then and in the future) would have representation based upon being a state (with 2 votes in the Senate) and based upon their population in the House of Representatives.
That has worked well up until now (though it worked better before the 17th Amendment, when state legislatures directly appointed the Senators), but this guy wants to changed it - and the only reason is to enforce a tyranny of the majority. Might as well do away with the entire Bill of Rights while your at it - because those rights (pre-existing our government) are protected against 99.99% majorities (unless previously repealed, and thankfully none of them have been).
Screw this Leftist jackhole - all that he and his fellow travelers want is to run this country like a bunch of dictatorial philosopher kings. Well, sorry, no kings for us in the USA, philosophers or not. That’s what the 2nd Amendment helps to protect us against.
“97 thousand people were stuck with the bad decisions made by a few.”
“States as states do need representation in the federal government. Under the Constitution, they have far too much. “
FEDERAL government
As in FEDERATION
Federation of what?
STATES
It is definitely the time to repeal the XVII Amendment that permitted the population election of senators.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seventeenth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution
You Got That Right!
Democracy is two wolves and a sheep taking a vote to decide what’s for dinner. Thankfully, we live in a Republic rather than a Democracy.
The Senate is elected by the People you ignorant political bigots at the Vox clown show.
Democracy is 5 wolves and 4 sheep voting on what is for dinner.
History tells anyone not blindly politically bigoted, like the Vox Clown Show, why we are a Republic and not a Democracy.
The Senate ceased to represent the states on April 8, 1913 when the 17th amendment replaced them being selected by state legislators with being elected by popular vote.
My thought as well. The senators SHOULD represent the state interests and the 17th Amendment neutered that.
“The Senate represents states, not people. That’s the problem”
Here’s the foundation of that conclusion:
“Right now, that means a bias toward Republicans”
It’s Box
The Senate was never designed nor intended to represent the people. That’s what the House is for
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