If we are to achieve true equality of opportunity in the United States, each person must have the same influence on who represents them. The Constitution of the United States establishes a very undemocratic way to determine federal elected officials. First let's look at a few interesting facts.
The population data is from the 2010 census. The official site is here. I found the Wikipedia site (here) easier to use. When people refer to the population of the United States, they are generally referring to the people in the 50 states plus the District of Columbia. The people who live in American Samoa, Guam, Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands don't even count and of course get no representation. I note that Puerto Rico has a population that is about the same size as that of Oklahoma or Connecticut.
The population of the United States including the 50 states and the District of Columbia is 308,745,538. Since the District of Columbia does not get any voting members of Congress, I would reduce the population by the 601,723 people who live in DC. So the number of people living in the 50 states who actually have representatives in Congress is 308,143,815. There are 100 voting members of the Senate. If they were divided equally, each Senator would represent 3,081,438 people but of course that is not the case. Wyoming is the smallest state by population (563,626), and each of the two Senators from Wyoming represent 281,813 people. California is the largest state by population (37,253,956) and each of its two Senators represent 18,626,978 people.
The same issue exists with members of the House of Representatives. There are 435 voting members of the House of Representatives. They represent a total of 308,143,815 people, so if all were equal each Representative would represent 708,377 people. However, every state gets one Representative. The sole representative from Wyoming represents only 563,626 people, while each of the 53 Representatives from California (on average) represents 702,905 people. If you combine both the House and the Senate, each of the 3 representatives to Congress from Wyoming represents just 187,875 people, while each of the 55 representatives to Congress from California represents 12,417,985 people. This is clearly not equal representation. I should also note that the 601,723 people in Washington DC have no voting representation in the House or the Senate while the 563,626 in Wyoming have 3 voting representative, two Senators and one member of Congress.
Of course the same is true for the election of the President since it is done by the electoral college which is based on virtually the same system. There are 538 electors in the college, three for each state plus the District of Columbia. For reasons that escape all understanding each state can determine how its electors will vote with many choosing a winner take all approach. As the general electorate becomes more divided politically and those lines are also geographic we can expect more times when the President will be elected after losing the popular vote.
The failure of our voting system in recent years is made clear by the fact that in the last 4 Congressional elections (2010, 2012, 2014 and 2016) the Democrats have won a greater percentage of the votes than the percentage of seats in the House of Representatives they have won. This difference often referred to as a "seats bonus" is the topic of an article by Molly Reynolds (here) that is very interesting talking about the 2016 election. She writes:
First, while Republicans, as of this writing, received a plurality of votes cast for Congress nationwide this year—49.9 percent, again according data from the Cook Political Report—they received a greater share, 55.2 percent, of the seats. Democrats, as a result, won a smaller share of seats than they did votes: 44.8 percent of seats as compared to 47.3 percent of the votes. (These numbers may change as final vote tallies are updated.)This differential is a result of the Constitution's undemocratic approach to voting as well as gerrymandering.
It seems clear that there are several amendments that must be made to the Constitution.
1. The electoral college must be eliminated so that the President and Vice President are elected by a direct popular vote.
2. The Senate seats must be done by population not state. Smaller states could join together with adjacent states to gain enough people to get one of the 100 Senate seats.
3. Congressional districts must be drawn in a non-partisan manner, i.e. no gerrymandering. Also a state that does not have enough population to get one of the 435 seats must join with other states to reach the threshold.
4. All American citizens must have a Senator and a Representative. That means that Washington DC, American Samoa, Guam, Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands must be included in our system of representative democracy.
5. The qualifications to vote must be set in the Constitution and not left to partisan state legislatures, so that all voter suppression is eliminated.
6. The Constitution must say that money is not speech and therefore not protected by the First Amendment. All political contributions must include the name, etc. of the person making the contribution and only real live citizens of the United States can make contributions. Contribution limits should be established on a per person per year in the aggregate to all candidates, parties, PACs, etc. The campaigns must be funded by the government and all campaigns must receive equal media coverage.
7. Election Day must be a holiday and multiple ways of voting must be available to all.
8. Lying, including reckless disregard for the truth, in a political campaign must be a felony.
I am sure there are other amendments, and there are many details that need to be put in place, but these would be a good start.
Thanks for reading and please comment,
The Unabashed Liberal
