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Should the House of Representatives be diluted?

Should the House of Representatives be diluted?

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radcen

radcen

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Should the House of Representatives be diluted?

Currently, voters are roughly divided up equally within a state. However, voters may not be represented equally from one state to another, given disparities in population. So, instead of having 435 Representatives as a hard number, divied up according to state population, we would have a hard maximum of constituents (population) for each Representative to represent. For example: each Representative represents 50,000 people. The number of Representatives would fluctuate, most likely continue to increase as population increses, but a citizen's representation would be roughly equal to all other citizen's representation.

Poll is simplified into yes/no/maybe options. Please elaborate on your choice.

I'm intrigued by the idea, and I would take it a step further. I would eliminate state boundary considerations entirely. The entire country would be divided up into rational 50,000 person blocks. Reason: The Senate represents the states, the House represents the people... ALL the people from the entire country, not the states.

By eliminating state boundaries you would (should) be able to bring together people across state lines who might have common concerns, plus you'd eliminate any potential inequality in district sizes if states have varying populations that cannot easily divided.
 
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i'd prefer to eliminate gerrymandering by using a computer program to redraw all districts using only census data. that would do a lot to address the problems in congress.
 
Helix said:
i'd prefer to eliminate gerrymandering by using a computer program to redraw all districts using only census data. that would do a lot to address the problems in congress.
Click to expand...

Excellent idea.
 
With the current ability of local state politicians to gerrymander the hell out of districts... dissolve the house as it does not represent the American people in any way or form.
 
radcen said:
Should the House of Representatives be diluted?

Currently, voters are roughly divided up equally within a state. However, voters may not be represented equally from one state to another, given disparities in population. So, instead of having 435 Representatives as a hard number, divied up according to state population, we would have a hard maximum of constituents (population) for each Representative to represent. For example: each Representative represents 50,000 people. The number of Representatives would fluctuate, most likely continue to increase as population increses, but a citizen's representation would be roughly equal to all other citizen's representation.

Poll is simplified into yes/no/maybe options. Please elaborate on your choice.

I'm intrigued by the idea, and I would take it a step further. I would eliminate state boundary considerations entirely. The entire country would be divided up into rational 50,000 person blocks. Reason: The Senate represents the states, the House represents the people... ALL the people from the entire country, not the states.

By eliminating state boundaries you would (should) be able to bring together people across state lines who might have common concerns, plus you'd eliminate any potential inequality in district sizes if states have varying populations that cannot easily divided.
Click to expand...

I do see your point and think it has some merit and is something that today's technology would allow that would have been near impossible much earlier.
I am not sure that it would make sense to dilute the House and I have yet to be persuaded that there is enough gain in the change to warrant fixing something that isn't broken.
 
Helix said:
i'd prefer to eliminate gerrymandering by using a computer program to redraw all districts using only census data. that would do a lot to address the problems in congress.
Click to expand...
While certainly a good idea, and one that I support already, that's a different issue than what this thread addresses. You're talking about the two major parties co-conspiring to cherry pick their influence based on whichever party dominates at the moment of gerrymandering. That's going to apply regardless the size of the House. Both ideas could be done in parallel.

This thread is asking about the inherent inequality of representation of the House itself, partly due to the unequal and greatly disparate populations of various states before gerrymandering even starts, and partly due to the increasing inaccessibility of the population to their Representatives because their districts are simply too big (population-wise).
 
joG said:
I do see your point and think it has some merit and is something that today's technology would allow that would have been near impossible much earlier.
I am not sure that it would make sense to dilute the House and I have yet to be persuaded that there is enough gain in the change to warrant fixing something that isn't broken.
Click to expand...

You had me until "...isn't broken". ;)

I have concerns that, the larger a Representative's constituency gets, the farther removed they become from said constituency. That, plus the inequalities from one District to another means disparate representation based on something as easily addressed as population distribution. A person in a 50,000 size District is more prone to get better results than a person in a 100,000 size District. The idea being that a more local District would be more in tune with the actual needs of the District, and thus more responsive.
 
radcen said:
While certainly a good idea, and one that I support already, that's a different issue than what this thread addresses. You're talking about the two major parties co-conspiring to cherry pick their influence based on whichever party dominates at the moment of gerrymandering. That's going to apply regardless the size of the House. Both ideas could be done in parallel.

This thread is asking about the inherent inequality of representation of the House itself, partly due to the unequal and greatly disparate populations of various states before gerrymandering even starts, and partly due to the increasing inaccessibility of the population to their Representatives because their districts are simply too big (population-wise).
Click to expand...

redrawing the districts using only population density data would probably help with that problem, too.
 
PeteEU said:
With the current ability of local state politicians to gerrymander the hell out of districts... dissolve the house as it does not represent the American people in any way or form.
Click to expand...
Eliminating state borders would also eliminate the states from having undue influence in the federal House. That's what the Senate is supposed to be for, the states and their interests.

Any gerrymandering that is done would have to be for the House only and at the federal level.
 
The Civil Rights Act will never allow it to happen.
 
I have to agree which is why in parliamentary systems that is what they usually do. For example here in Canada the ridings get redrawn every 10 years and new seats are added if the population warrants it because here a riding is ~100,000 people. As a result we have some ridings that only cover a neighbourhood in a large city and some ridings larger than most US states. The only real problem is physically adding seats to the chamber.
 
Helix said:
redrawing the districts using only population density data would probably help with that problem, too.
Click to expand...

Not so. States vary widely in population and there are only 435 seats to go around. With the current system there's no way to divide 435 seats equally (for the people overall), or even near so, especially when states are given x-number of seats themselves.

State boundaries need to be taken out of the equation entirely. Then, you could do better gerrymandering, and that would help to a degree, but you'd still have Districts with 733,333+/- people (319m / 435), which is too unwieldy. No Representative can effectively address that many people's concerns. Smaller Districts would be easier to manage and be more responsive.

If an always fluctuating number of seats is too uncomfortable for some, at least double or triple the number of seats so that the representation can be more manageable and responsive.
 
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Carjosse said:
What does that have to do with this?
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Section 5 Of the Civil Rights Act demands that majority minority districts be established in certain states.
 
apdst said:
Section 5 Of the Civil Rights Act demands that majority minority districts be established in certain states.
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From what I have read that practice has ended and is unconstitutional to draw districts solely based on race. That is according to both the Department of Justice and Wikipedia.
 
Carjosse said:
From what I have read that practice has ended and is unconstitutional to draw districts solely based on race. That is according to both the Department of Justice and Wikipedia.
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It hasn't ended. Its still mandated by law in certain states.
 
Carjosse said:
From what I have read that practice has ended and is unconstitutional to draw districts solely based on race. That is according to both the Department of Justice and Wikipedia.
Click to expand...

It's still in place. It's the voting rights act, not the Civil rights act. I correct myself on that.
 
radcen said:
Not so. States vary widely in population and there are only 435 seats to go around. With the current system there's no way to divide 435 seats equally (for the people overall), or even near so, especially when states are given x-number of seats themselves.

State boundaries need to be taken out of the equation entirely. Then, you could do better gerrymandering, and that would help to a degree, but you'd still have Districts with 733,333+/- people (319m / 435), which is too unwieldy. No Representative can effectively address that many people's concerns. Smaller Districts would be easier to manage and be more responsive.

If an always fluctuating number of seats is too uncomfortable for some, at least double or triple the number of seats so that the representation can be more manageable and responsive.
Click to expand...

in my opinion, the biggest problem is the hyperpartisan manipulation of districts, which is resulting in more extreme candidates who are unwilling to compromise. the root problem is the duopoly itself, and gerrymandering not only makes it worse, but also unworkable. i'd like to see these problems addressed.
 
radcen said:
Should the House of Representatives be diluted?

Currently, voters are roughly divided up equally within a state. However, voters may not be represented equally from one state to another, given disparities in population. So, instead of having 435 Representatives as a hard number, divied up according to state population, we would have a hard maximum of constituents (population) for each Representative to represent. For example: each Representative represents 50,000 people. The number of Representatives would fluctuate, most likely continue to increase as population increses, but a citizen's representation would be roughly equal to all other citizen's representation.

Poll is simplified into yes/no/maybe options. Please elaborate on your choice.

I'm intrigued by the idea, and I would take it a step further. I would eliminate state boundary considerations entirely. The entire country would be divided up into rational 50,000 person blocks. Reason: The Senate represents the states, the House represents the people... ALL the people from the entire country, not the states.

By eliminating state boundaries you would (should) be able to bring together people across state lines who might have common concerns, plus you'd eliminate any potential inequality in district sizes if states have varying populations that cannot easily divided.
Click to expand...

But if you had one representative for every 50,000 Americans you'd end up with something like over 6,000 representatives.
 
radcen said:
Should the House of Representatives be diluted?

Currently, voters are roughly divided up equally within a state. However, voters may not be represented equally from one state to another, given disparities in population. So, instead of having 435 Representatives as a hard number, divied up according to state population, we would have a hard maximum of constituents (population) for each Representative to represent. For example: each Representative represents 50,000 people. The number of Representatives would fluctuate, most likely continue to increase as population increses, but a citizen's representation would be roughly equal to all other citizen's representation.

Poll is simplified into yes/no/maybe options. Please elaborate on your choice.

I'm intrigued by the idea, and I would take it a step further. I would eliminate state boundary considerations entirely. The entire country would be divided up into rational 50,000 person blocks. Reason: The Senate represents the states, the House represents the people... ALL the people from the entire country, not the states.

By eliminating state boundaries you would (should) be able to bring together people across state lines who might have common concerns, plus you'd eliminate any potential inequality in district sizes if states have varying populations that cannot easily divided.
Click to expand...

No, the House represents the People of the State, not the People of the Nation.
 
PeteEU said:
With the current ability of local state politicians to gerrymander the hell out of districts... dissolve the house as it does not represent the American people in any way or form.
Click to expand...

The old "Throw the baby out with the bathwater." solution...
 
faithful_servant said:
No, the House represents the People of the State, not the People of the Nation.
Click to expand...
I can see that, but if so then maybe it's time to change that. Our country is much more mobile and irretrievably interconnected than it was 200+ years ago. And we'd still have the Senate to represent the states interests. And people in a state should be voting as a state, really.
 
I just want to see an end to gerrymandering.
 
Helix said:
i'd prefer to eliminate gerrymandering by using a computer program to redraw all districts using only census data. that would do a lot to address the problems in congress.
Click to expand...

If you eliminate gerrymandering, how will you guarantee the number of minorities in the House of Representatives.

We have enough problems now with insane representatives. Increase the number and the number who insist George Bush blew up the World Trade Center and the island of Guam might sink if we sent more marines there would increase.

At each census, some states gain in representatives because their population has increased and some lose representatives because of the number of people driven to leave the state.

I think that system is quite reasonable.

This link has an interesting map showing who gained and who lost representatives in the last census.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_congressional_apportionment
That system also explains why the White House moved control of the census bureau to the President. Control the findings on the census and control Congress.
 
Patrickt said:
If you eliminate gerrymandering, how will you guarantee the number of minorities in the House of Representatives.

We have enough problems now with insane representatives. Increase the number and the number who insist George Bush blew up the World Trade Center and the island of Guam might sink if we sent more marines there would increase.

At each census, some states gain in representatives because their population has increased and some lose representatives because of the number of people driven to leave the state.

I think that system is quite reasonable.

This link has an interesting map showing who gained and who lost representatives in the last census.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_congressional_apportionment
That system also explains why the White House moved control of the census bureau to the President. Control the findings on the census and control Congress.
Click to expand...

so are you against eliminating gerrymandering?
 
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