Jeff Jacoby has this column in the Boston Globe of December 27, advocating that Congress vote to enlarge the membership of the U.S. House of Representatives. See here. Thanks to ElectionLawBlog for the link.
Jeff Jacoby has this column in the Boston Globe of December 27, advocating that Congress vote to enlarge the membership of the U.S. House of Representatives. See here. Thanks to ElectionLawBlog for the link.
1200 Now.
That’s a reasonable number. We should increase the number of members of the House of Representatives to 1200 members. This would also improve the Electoral College numbers with 1300 votes. States should use this adjustment period to adopt the Maine/Nebraska system of choosing Electors.
At the same time, the remaining habitated portion of DC should be returned to Maryland.
We should also reduce Congressional and Senate pay to $100,000 per year (or less) and freeze it there. (All other government salaries should be reduced and capped at $100,000 with all government employees below $100k taking a 5% pay cut.)
A major justification for increasing the size of the U. S. House during the 19th Century was the increasing number of states in the Union. With the expected filling in of New Mexico and Arizona after the 1910 Census, its quite likely that Congress didn’t REALLY see the need to continue increasing the size of the House. Growing from 105 to 435 seats from their perspective to adjust for the Union growing from 13 to 48 states seemed to be reasonable enough.
An interesting research project would be to study India’s over 60-year history of voting for their National Parliament. When they gained independence in 1948 their population was larger than the current level in the United States. With far fewer states than we have they managed to maintain both a wider choice of parties and shifts in control back and forth regarding the Gandhi political dynasty.
The only country that has operated (so to speak) with a National legislature much larger than the U. K.’s 650 seats was the Soviet Union. They had over 2,000 members and the party basically kept everyone in line. Another question is how would House meetings be organized. I see it as very likely that EVEN MORE legislation would be passed by members who had little opportunity to read what any bill they vote on fully contains. If the U. S. were to substantially increase the size of the House, it is questionable whether most people nowadays would support it. They’re likely to see THAT as just adding more USELESS OVER-PAID politicians in Washington.
The only level that I see as having a chance of being workable would be to follow he Constitution strictly and by legislation change the House membership to be computed by using the population of the smallest of the 48 states to determine the membership of each states delegation. That would increase the House to 543 seats for this decade.
P.R. = Total Votes / Total Seats = Equal votes needed for each seat winner.
Even a THREE member H.Reps. — more govt, less govt, the muddled middle — perhaps a 4th neutral Speaker.
EXACT P.R. — Winners have a voting power equal to the direct votes and transferred loser votes received.
e.g. — 46 – 44 – 10
Would need game show (TV Price is Right) adding device for larger legislative bodies.
— Pending direct Democracy for those folks having the time / energy to vote directly on all or some bills.
This stuff AIN’T atomic physics — except to folks having brainwashed brains regarding AREA fixations — States and gerrymander districts inside States.
See the once upon a time flat earth and/or earth is center of universe science MORONS.
I have recently complained the congressman in my part of New York State, Maurice Hinchey (D-22nd) refused several years ago to support a proposal, by Charlie Rangel if I remember correctly, to conduct a congressional study of the size of the House of Representatives, and recommend possible changes. Hinchey refused to support this proposal, and now his district will likely disappear with the 2011 reapportionament. New York is going to lose two seats.
When does a legislative body become a TOTAL mob scene ???
See the mere 650 MPs in the U.K. House of Commons — many of them yelling at each other on the Front Benches during debates — about 10 feet apart – face to face. See HC TV.
How much extra space, if any, is in the House wing of the Capitol for more gerrymander Reps. ???
Perhaps abolish the gerrymander U.S.A. Senate to have more gerrymander U.S.A. Reps in the current Senate wing ??? — or perhaps make ALL of D.C. a giant stadium for a zillion Reps to yell at each other ???
— i.e. remake D.C. to be 10 miles square again = 100 square miles full of a zillion Reps shoulder to shoulder yelling and screaming at the other folks about 5 miles away ???
High tech binocs and satellite TV for all Reps to keep up with the action.
P.R. now — even 101 is quite enough to represent all major factions — perhaps a zillion more for committees.
Total Votes / Total Seats = Equal votes needed for each Rep.
The lawsuit which argued for an expansion of the House of Representatives, noted that based on 2000 Census, that if the House of Representative were increased in size to 1760 members, that interstate inequality in congressional district populations could be reduced to less than 10%, a standard that is usually considered a safe harbor for legislatures, especially when those districts are required to conform to county or other jurisdictional boundaries.
For 2010, the equivalent required House size is 3258. I wonder whether the plaintiffs will be updating their briefs?
If the size of the House was reduced from 435 to 333, the size of government would be reduced and equality improved.
#2 How about continuous constitutional amendments to ABOLISH the EVIL ROTTED smallest State — to merge it with the nearest smallest State — keep going until there is ONE State with the entire U.S.A. population ???
Also of course abolish the minority rule Senate and the minority rule Electoral College in the process.
REAL Democracy NOW via P.R. — to save Civilization from the party hack powermad gerrymander oligarchs in the U.S.A. gerrymander Congress.
Well all I can say is that any American showing of BBC Parliament is obviously refilmed with actors for drama and suspense by the way Demo Rep makes it out. Perhaps the US Congress should copy the open banter of the UK Parliament, rather than attempting to avoid it!
Anyway, for only 650 MP’s the UK is in a similar situation to the US in which its population continues to go up and the level of representation not.
It could be argued of course that we have 650, while the US has only 435 despite having only 60 Million to US’s 300+ Million persons; but the US also has an extra level of Government in the form of State Congress while we simply have local and national Government with small bodies for Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland (England, of course, continues to live without its own).
Part of the bill next year of reforming the British system is to reduce, not increase the level of Westminster MP’s from 650 to 600, a devastating cut that is enough for some of us to vote against the referendum taking place; even though the issue of cutting isn’t planned to be voted on. If the referendum fails, the bill fails, and that right now seems to be the only way to guarantee our level of representation.
#8 Did the Cons-LibDems choose 600 to MAXIMIZE the percentage of Labour concentration camp gerrymander districts in the older central cities ???
1200s — House of Commons = MAJOR advance/progess for the COMMON folks against the EVIL bad olde monarchs/oligarchs.
2000s — First past the post [plurality winners] in parliamentary regimes = New Age gerrymander monarchs/oligarchs = MAJOR regression to the EVIL past.