On many of the major issues of the day the American people can’t get what they actually want from the federal government. Here are some examples:
65% of Americans support keeping abortion legal in all or most cases
61% of Americans support a ban on sales of assault weapons
77% support a 30 day waiting period
80% support allowing police officers to take weapons away from those deemed to be a danger to themselves or others
80% support mental health background checks for gun purchases
81% support increasing the age for gun ownership to 21
81% support improving enforcement of existing gun laws
87% support requiring criminal background checks on all gun purchases
65% of Americans believe the government is spending too little on education
63% of Americans believe the government is spending too little on health care
62% of Americans believe the government is spending too little on social security
58% of Americans believe the government is spending too little on medicare
53% of Americans believe the government is spending too little on border security
(https://apnews.com/article/spending-budget-poll-biden-cd55f1c3859b62a861cdbdc0cd23bd79)
And yet getting changes to public policy at the national level on any of the above issues is nearly impossible. The federal government just isn’t listening to what Americans actually want.
Why is that? First let’s consider the House of Representatives. The Reapportionment Act of 1929 capped the number of members of the House at 435 (with some very limited exceptions). The Constitution states (in Article I Section 2) that every state must have at least 1 representative. Those two constraints together have resulted in a situation in which states of low population are vastly overrepresented. It has gotten so bad that as of the 2020 Census the state of California has about 28% less representation in the House than it should on the basis of population alone. That is grossly unfair to the people of California, but the same problem affects the voters of every state with more than the average state population.
Then there’s the Senate. As of the 2020 Census there are 9 states that between them have more than 50% of total U.S. population. The residents of those 9 states therefore have only 18% representation in the Senate. The remaining 82% of the power in the Senate is held by states that together contain less than 50% of total population. That, too, is grossly unfair to the voters of the most populous states.
And finally we must discuss the Electoral College. The sole reason why the 2020 election devolved into strident claims of voter fraud is because of the existence of the Electoral College. Joe Biden won the popular vote by over 7 million votes. And yet Trump had only to flip 5,900 votes in Georgia, 10,400 votes in Wisconsin, and 5,300 votes in Arizona to produce an Electoral College tie, and that would have thrown the final decision into the House of Representatives where the Republican Party had a solid majority. Despite his 7 million vote majority in the popular vote Biden was less than 22,000 votes from losing the entire election to Donald Trump. That represents about 0.3% of Biden’s 7 million vote margin.
These disparities are the product of bad governmental design. Our Constitution is not serving us well and it is long past time for drastic reform. And what should that reform look like? I propose that we trust democracy– and the people. The only way to make the federal government more responsive to the needs and desires of the people is to make it more democratic, not less. In pursuit of that end I propose the following principles:
1. The President should be elected solely on the basis of the popular vote. The Electoral College must be abolished.
2. The House should represent all people across the nation equally in proportion to the national population.
3. The Senate should also represent the people, not states. The states have been guaranteed all the rights they require in Article IV of the Constitution. There is no need for states to have separate representation at the federal level.
4. The House and the Senate should have separate responsibilities, and therefore different characters and processes.
5. Both the Senate and House should be capped at a fixed number of members, regardless of the number of states in the union or the size of the nation’s population. This will ensure that neither body grows without bound as the nation grows.
6. The size of each body should be based on the optimal size for a body that must efficiently conduct the affairs of each as defined under Principle # 4 above.
7. The Senate and the House should represent different aspects of the national character, not the character of local within-state regions. This implies that different methods of selection should be used for the members of the two bodies.
8. The methods of selection employed in satisfaction of Principle #7 should be designed to correlate strongly with the separate characters of the two bodies as defined in Principle #4.
Only Principle #4 above is currently guaranteed in the Constitution. All of the remaining principles would require significant changes to the Constitution itself. And should you wonder if it is possible for any system to comply with Principles 1 through 8 above, I can assure you that the answer is Yes. I have a specific proposal for that, but I would be happy to consider any system that fully comports with all of these principles. Let me hear yours.
The Constitution has been amended 27 times thus far. The overall trend over the history of the country has been to expand suffrage to ever greater numbers of people, and to expand the rights of individuals to guarantee and protect their freedoms. If anything the above Principles would strengthen our nation by extending the democratic elements of our government and by turning more power over to the people themselves. Trust the people!
David S. Moore: Insights & Innovations 
Interesting thoughts. I’m not certain what you intend regarding representing a ‘National’ character rather than ‘character of local within-state regions.’ My understanding is that the House and Senate reps should be expressing the unique character and needs of their states, since the concept was to be ‘United States’ not a central large ‘Nation’.
If you’re saying that we need to change that and have a central government that’s a democracy rather than a representational government, then at this time I would disagree. I don’t believe our population is effectively educated and engaged enough to come together and vote responsibly as one body and one government. And I also question if the US would ever work that way because of the extreme diversity of our regions and the difference in their needs both philosophically and geographically/economically.
I believe government works best at the community level, where the people and their elected officials have contact with each other and can feel mutual responsibility to one another. Your advice about bodies becoming too large to effectively run is well taken. I think this is why de-centralizing and then having a representative interaction from the small communities is important, and a ‘National’ character and government should just be the offshoot of decisions made in interest of those diverse communities. The central government structure should be as small as possible to work out differences and create common growth.
I also think that states are geographically different enough, and have individually different resource needs, so that having two reps per state, no matter the size of the population, makes sense and is not unfair. The Senate is one body and this is it’s unique character and purpose. In my opinion, this allows development and potential population growth if a physical state area can be represented equally. Then the population-based House balances the power equation for decision-making. Otherwise states that are not populated would likely remain so since they would have almost no representation for their needs.
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You:
I’m not certain what you intend regarding representing a ‘National’ character rather than ‘character of local within-state regions.’ My understanding is that the House and Senate reps should be expressing the unique character and needs of their states, since the concept was to be ‘United States’ not a central large ‘Nation’.
Response:
This very question was debated at the Federal Convention Debates during which the U.S. Constitution was written. Here is what Mr. Governor Morris had to say about it:
It had been sd … that the new Governt would be partly national, partly federal; that it ought in the first quality to protect individuals; in the second, the States. But in what quality was it to protect the aggregate interest of the whole. Among the many provisions which had been urged, he had seen none for supporting the dignity and splendor of the American Empire. … [T]he great objects of the nation had been sacrificed constantly to local views. … But particular States … were originally nothing more than colonial corporations. On the declaration of Independence, a Governmt was to be formed. The small States aware of the necessity of preventing anarchy, and taking advantage of the moment, extorted from the large ones an equality of votes. Standing now on that ground, they demand under the new system greater rights as men, than their fellow Citizens of the large States.
I would argue that the structure of the Constitution is what led us inexorably to the Civil War. Slave owners, who were well represented at the Federal Convention, wanted to prevent the Congress from abolishing slavery. They knew that the slave states had smaller free populations than did the non-slave states and their interest was in protecting the rights of “property,” by which they meant slave ownership. So they wanted the states to have equal votes in the Senate to ensure that they would be able to block non-slave states from passing any legislation that would impose limits on slave ownership. That’s why the Constitution has a clause that specifically forbade Congress from enacting any legislation concerning slavery for 20 years. And it’s also why each slave was counted as 3/5 of a person for the purposes of apportionment in the House of Representatives.
Today the structure of our Constitution is pushing us ever further to disunity. The only person at the national level who truly represents the American people as a whole is the President, and that role is encumbered by the Electoral College. What this country needs is more unity, not less. And the only way to get it is by ensuring that the character of the nation as a whole is fully represented at the national level.
You:
The central government structure should be as small as possible to work out differences and create common growth.
Response:
Nobody actually believes in “small” government. That’s just a slogan that people repeat without really thinking about it. In 1790 the U.S. Congress created the United States Army. Prior to that time the nation was defended under the Constitution by the state operated militias– which would be the “small government” approach to addressing the problem of the national defense. Nobody wants to go back to that model.
The phrase “small government” has been used repeatedly in two major contexts. First, it has been used it as a code phrase by those who want the entire New Deal rolled back. They know the idea of eliminating Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid is extremely unpopular– but they still want to talk about it as if there might be some way they could sneak it past the legislature. “Small government” gives them a way to talk about it without actually having to explain the details of what they really mean. The second major context in which the “small government” phrase has been used is by those who resent the federal government’s enforcement of voting rights and civil rights. “Small government” in their minds means leaving all of those matters to the states, thereby ensuring that its advocates will be able to restore their former positions of political supremacy. Neither of those meanings of “small government” are intended to serve the greater good.
You:
If you’re saying that we need to change that and have a central government that’s a democracy rather than a representational government, then at this time I would disagree. I don’t believe our population is effectively educated and engaged enough to come together and vote responsibly as one body and one government.
Response:
The U.S. population has news and information readily available. We have nearly universal literacy. The people of this country are as educated as any people have ever been. So when do you think the people of this nation– or of any nation– would be educated enough?
If you read the principles I offered you’ll see that I’m not proposing a true democracy. I’m proposing a representational democracy. I’m just proposing that we should change what aspects of American society the persons elected to government should represent. Periclean Athens was a true democracy in that every landed male citizen of Athens over 21 could participate in the Assembly, which voted on every matter. That’s a true participatory democracy. I’m proposing a representational democracy, but one that would be very different from what we have today.
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Thanks for your thoughtful reply.
I understand that the equal state votes regardless of population was used to support slavery, but there are and could be many other examples of noble causes where it protected the citizens of those states, and your example does prove out that various parts of the country have different interests. I think those differences should be represented equally in the Senate, while being balanced by the population based House.
Also, it’s obviously flawed and horrific to have counted the people who were held in slavery as less than whole men.
When I’m suggesting small central government, I don’t mean to break down shared interest defense like our united military. Those are the things that are the minimum needed to keep peace and represent all of the states’ needs. Some level of oversight of human rights and equal wealth distribution also makes sense to me, but I think it should be in measure of enforcement for states that are not taking care of their citizens instead of sending so much to a central source just to have the expense, potential inequality of redistribution, and opportunity for hidden corruption of using the massive funds. If funds are distributed to such causes at a level ‘closer to home’ the pot is smaller, so easier to watch over to avoid corruption, and I believe is more likely to get to people and groups that truly need them, because when you live in the community you directly see the need, instead of having cold proposals and arguments as the basis to determine need somewhere on the other side of the country.
Bottom line, in my opinion, just because these ideals have been used to defend causes you and I agree are unethical, and there are those that want to use them to break down fund distribution that helps the needy that we agree should be helped, doesn’t mean the principles are flawed.
In the same way, just because the central government set according to your principles would and/or has worked for certain issues doesn’t mean it is the best way to go overall.
I think both options have pros and cons.
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You:
Bottom line, in my opinion, just because these ideals have been used to defend causes you and I agree are unethical, and there are those that want to use them to break down fund distribution that helps the needy that we agree should be helped, doesn’t mean the principles are flawed.
Response:
The fact that the Senate is the place where legislation goes to die is the result of the founding principles of the Constitution. So yes, we have proof that the principles are flawed. The Senate’s composition is largely what led to the Civil War because it gave slave owning states sufficient power to block any anti-slavery legislation. You’re minimizing the ill effects of that calamity, and you’re defending a status quo that is demonstrably amplifying differences. I’m advocating a system that would build on the common interests of all of the people across the entire nation. You’re for greater disunity, I’m for greater unity.
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I’d like to respectfully disagree. I believe that forming a system where urbanites – who will naturally have a vast majority of popular votes – can create all the policies for the nation will cause more dissent and division. That system will allow one point of view to dominate others instead of forcing healthy, though difficult, debate. In the present system, change takes time, but can be achieved by ideas and needs that start out as a minority opinion, perhaps due to regional understanding. If majority rules, the speed of the rule of those ideals will never allow learning and compromise with others and, I believe that will divide the nation further. A system that gives support for minority voices to be heard is crucial to unity. Having a balancing governing force, like the House, is also crucial to ultimately bring the debate and help disagreements in Senate move forward. The trouble comes when either or both bodies are not adequately doing their jobs of debate and compromise, but rather draw lines in the sand.
In my opinion, when ideological and/or economic interests of different parts of the country become too far apart for compromise, it doesn’t matter what form of representation is in place there will still be dissent and division. All that strict population representation does is allows urban ideals to win in our governing system.
Like it or not, the states that had less population and were economically dependent on slavery were filled with American citizens with a right to have their views represented. In my opinion the war was a necessary evil to settle that once and for all. The fundamental differences between those who supported slavery and those who did not would never have been settled peacefully because one ‘side’ couldn’t live with it morally and the other couldn’t live with it economically if the other side had their way. I think no matter the majority vote at the time, the other side would not have honored the outcome of the law and would have revolted.
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You:
If majority rules, the speed of the rule of those ideals will never allow learning and compromise with others and, I believe that will divide the nation further.
Response:
Majority rule is the foundational principle of democracy, so you don’t believe in democracy. I do. I trust the people, you don’t.
You:
In my opinion, when ideological and/or economic interests of different parts of the country become too far apart for compromise, it doesn’t matter what form of representation is in place there will still be dissent and division.
Response:
But the ideological and economic interests of different parts of the country aren’t as far apart as you think. Go back to my first posting and review the issues I enumerated and their respective levels of public support. Those are national figures, and they do indeed represent the broad desiderata of the American people across all regions of the country. There is far more agreement on the issues of the day than disagreement. The problem is that our government is not designed to respond to what the people actually want. Instead it is designed to accentuate differences rather than to build on common goals and aspirations, and that’s because local interests are over-represented in the government.
You: All that strict population representation does is allows urban ideals to win in our governing system.
Response:
We have a system in which predominantly rural regions have a majority in the Senate, are over-represented in the House, and exert undue influence on the Electoral College. So at present we are under minority control. That doesn’t seem to bother you in the least. What bothers you is that the 89% of Americans who live in urban centers might gain proportionate representation in the government. What is it that you have against urban dwellers? Why do you think they don’t deserve fair representation? Do you think they’re not “real” Americans?
You:
Like it or not, the states that had less population and were economically dependent on slavery were filled with American citizens with a right to have their views represented.
Response:
Yes, but not by counting each slave– who could not vote– as 3/5 of a person for the purposes of representation in the House.
You:
I think no matter the majority vote at the time, the other side would not have honored the outcome of the law and would have revolted.
Response:
During the Lincoln – Douglas debates Lincoln said that the Dred Scott decision was the law of the land. Lincoln was a lawyer, and he believed in the rule of law. Despite that fact seven southern states seceded from the Union after the 1860 election and before Lincoln was even inaugurated. The South began the Civil War by attacking Fort Sumpter. And why? Because the Southern states wanted all newly admitted states to support slavery and they knew that Congress wasn’t going to go along with that. The war was entirely the doing of the slave states. Yet even when the CSA had its eventual full complement of 11 states its total population was only about 29% of total U.S. population. (That figure includes both free and slave.) They were always a very small minority.
Overall:
You are arguing for the status quo, but I don’t get the impression that you fully understand how the status quo arose. The Articles of Confederation were a dismal failure primarily because it was a system in which every state had one vote, so Congress created a convention to debate possible solutions– the Federal Convention. The attendees at the Federal Convention agreed pretty quickly on the structure of the House of Representatives, but they debated for several weeks about the Senate. Finally they formed a committee to resolve the issue. But they purposefully excluded James Madison and James Wilson, the two most vocal proponents of representational democracy, from membership on the committee. So they had already caved in to the demands of the small states at the moment they created the committee. It wasn’t a decision made on the basis of lofty principles of political philosophy.
I think it is now time to go back to first principles, to rethink the structure of government itself. The people of this country are frustrated that they can’t get what they want from government– so why not design the government to be more responsive? A government that meets the eight principles I enumerated in my original posting is far more likely to do that than what we currently have.
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I certainly agree that our National governing is currently broken, but I also believe it has worked very well in the past, so it may be the way it’s being administrated rather than the format of the system. We came through the Civil War, and functioned well again as a Union, and we came through the extreme internal unrest and social revolution of the 60’s and 70’s as a Union. We became and have maintained status as one of the largest and strongest world economies and powers.
I don’t have anything against Urbanites, I lived in big cities most of my life and am one. But I also lived rural and suburban in various parts of the US, and I’m aware of the voices and values in many very different social stratas in many areas. I will always have concerns that minority interests will be marginalized if we have more populace control than we currently do.
You’re correct, we have a fundamentally different level of trusting ‘the people’.
I find your ideas interesting and appreciate the evaluation and debate they create. Thanks for the conversation!
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