I suspect I'm gonna get really annoying about this.
One thing not mentioned in this article that could be interesting is multi member districts. Instead of reducing the size of a district to 1 per 40,000, you could easily make the district 120,000 and have 3 representatives from it. This is actually a more reliable way to bring in third parties, because rank ordered voting could be used to determine the three winners. There are a lot of places where you might get three from a single party or two and one, but there are also a lot of places where there would certainly be Greens or Libertarians who have enough support to come in second or third.
I despise the GOP, but I'm not naive enough to think that anywhere in the world is better served by a single point of view. It's hard to imagine bringing in more voices with less power per voice could be a bad thing for the country. We're already getting full blown internet conspiracy theorists in Congress, so it's not like it can get any worse.
Duverger's Law holds that plurality elections will give you two parties. Washington uses a top-two primary system which means our insurance commissioner, who has held the office since 2001, is running against this guy.
(He's 36)
Note that the dude who channels the ghost of Nixon won a slot in the top two because he's Republican. The Libertarian guy was actually more qualified but I mean... he's a Libertarian.
There were a couple of these in our election this year, but this entry definitely won the Weirdo Award.
I can't even comprehend what he is offering... that he's going to abdicate his elected role and divest the decision making power to a group of 168 college students?
And why 168?
And... oh never mind.
Back when the way you swapped samples for your sampler was mailing CDRs across the country, I ended up befriending a dude about 15 miles away. He loved k-pop back before BTS was born. Interesting guy.
Anyway I'm leafing through the voter guide and there he is, the libertarian candidate for lieutenant governor. So I call him up despite the fact that it was 10:30 at night.
"Dude - you're running for lieutenant governor?"
(yawns) "Uhm... I think so?"
"No dude you're right here in the voter guide."
"Oh yeah. yeah, I am."
"As a libertarian?"
"Yeah dude I go to their meetings. Someone's gotta run for everything. We draw straws."
"You drew the short straw so now you're the libertarian candidate for lieutenant governor?"
"Yeah!"
"Uhm... okay. So why should I vote for you?"
"'cuz we're buddies!"
"Yeah but do you have like, policies in mind or anything?"
"Well we're against big government."
"...gotcha. Lemme think about it."
He was not elected lieutenant governor.
Yeah I think you'd need a transition period. It's still a winner-take-all election, so people will generally split along the two party lines. Multi-member districts with rank-choice voting (at least in theory) break the winner-take-all approach.
That dude is awesome though. I might vote for him anyway, since he has many of the powers of Jefferson.
OK. One last comment on this (for now)...
IF the House expands to 6000 members and the Electoral College is burned at the stake, as it should have been, how does this impact the Framers original idea that "politician" was a part-time job?
Right now, each of these people is paid a ridiculously large sum of money for their "service". Over $100k/year.
How much of a hit to the State budget will it be? Especially in populous states like CA and NY?
And, if there are more Representatives, and each of them serves on fewer committees, and they vote primarily electronically (as the article surmises), then do we return to the general idea of "part-time politicians"?
Because that sounds pretty dang good to me...
Salary, House of Representatives: $174,000
Population of WA state: 7,615,000
WA congressional delegation: 10 representatives, 2 senators, $2,088,000 salary
WA congressional delegation, 1 representative per 30,000 constituents: 254 representatives, 2 senators, $44,800,000 salary
Dome cleaning and masonry repair: $3.4m
WA state budget: $53B
UW Football head coach salary: $3M
Additional salary expenses per resident: $4.87
Right?
Fargo would get five reps. Bozeman would get two. Flagstaff would get three but the fuckin' Navajo Nation would get six. Greater LA would get 626 so it's not like this a massive win for the red states but fuckin' hell right now Bozeman's got one and greater LA has 18.
Here's Bozeman's one so fuck Bozeman.
Fuck Bozeman except for the world class ice climbing which drives a season worth of their economy.
States that have ratified the Congressional Apportionment Act:
Kentucky
Maryland
New Hampshire
New Jersey
New York
North Carolina
Pennsylvania
Rhode Island
South Carolina
Vermont
Virginia
And there are four ways to change the Constitution:
- "There are actually four ways.
(1) Both houses propose an amendment with a two-thirds vote, and three-fourths of the state legislatures approve. Twenty-six of the 27 amendments were approved in this manner.
(2) Both houses propose an amendment with a two-thirds vote, and three-fourths of the states approve the amendment via ratifying conventions. Only the 21st Amendment, which repealed Prohibition, was passed in this manner.
(3) Two-thirds of the state legislatures call on Congress to hold a constitutional convention, and three-fourths of the state legislatures approve the amendment.
(4) Two-thirds of the state legislatures call on Congress to hold a constitutional convention, and three-fourths of the states approve the amendment via ratifying conventions."
