Abolish The Senate

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

It was a big mistake for the court to rule as it did with Reynolds back in the 1960's. The Senate is not designed to be OMOV and applying a different standard to the State Senate's on the basis of the 14th Amendment only serves to create a contradiction between Article 1 and the 14th amendment.

Illinois would be much better if it had a State Senate by county. As it is now the South and Central parts of the state's can litterally get crapped on and that will increasingly be the case now that Southern ILL is just as Republican as Central ILL and thus Democrats have no incentive to appeal to that region. Everett Dirksen warned about this back then regarding Illinois.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

The reason the court ruled that state senate districts had to be drawn equally, was because the rural counties were getting a highly disproportionate amount of representation. In California, Los Angeles County had only one state Senator, while several rural counties were distributed into several low population districts.

But the implication is that a Senate is suppose to be proportionate to population at all and the US Senate is most certainly not. It makes no sense that the court should create a double standard regarding the structure of a Senate within the Constitution, particularly when Article 1 endorses a Senate that is not proportional for the very reason of creating balance of interests. The Court completely abandoned that in 1962 and has thus created one problem in the solving of another.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

The reason the court ruled that state senate districts had to be drawn equally, was because the rural counties were getting a highly disproportionate amount of representation. In California, Los Angeles County had only one state Senator, while several rural counties were distributed into several low population districts.

But the implication is that a Senate is suppose to be proportionate to population at all and the US Senate is most certainly not. It makes no sense that the court should create a double standard regarding the structure of a Senate within the Constitution, particularly when Article 1 endorses a Senate that is not proportional for the very reason of creating balance of interests. The Court completely abandoned that in 1962 and has thus created one problem in the solving of another.

Proportional representation is balanced... That's the point. Disproportionate representation is what is unbalanced. I mean, it depends on what you're trying to balance. States or people? The former was created by the latter, to serve the latter. Even Hobbes, the great champion of the State, put his argument in terms of what it could do for Man. Even the worst dictatorships set up a state only to serve some person(s), if only the dictator himself. In the United States, the states were created largely arbitrarily; they do not reflect any long standing religions, languages, ethnicities, or cultures; their only rational basis is the fact that they exist, as accidents of history. Human beings, on the other hand, are the basic building block of society and each have the same intrinsic moral worth merely by being human. It's no contest.

The Senate is not going to be abolished because the Constitution has made it impossible (and because it is politically out of the question), but let's not pretend there is any good reason for arbitrary representation "by state."

 You balance interests of different groups of people because a dictatorship of the simple 51% majority nationwide could also lead to division as interests specific to a particular region are ignored. Like agricultural issues in small states or hurricane preparedness along the Alantic coast.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

By representing every state equally, regardless of population, the Senate actually is representative of a pseudo-nation with different demographic characteristics than the actual country. The pseudo-nation represented by the Senate is more white (non-Hispanic), less black and less Hispanic than the nation at large. This is likely not surprising. I haven't dug that far into the rest, but it would be interesting to see what other trends there are in the actual population versus the population implied by the Senate.

And yet which chamber has actually passed a comprehensive bill on immigration?

The Senate was also the first chamber to pass the thirteenth amendment way back in the Civil War. Because of the Senate's nature, it is more willing to compromise because its purpose is as I said, designed to encourage states to join together to ensure each other's interests are protected and that instills a greater sense of comity then the majoritarian House has historically functioned as. The House is also far more partisan and far more political because it is up every two years instead of every six years.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

The reason the court ruled that state senate districts had to be drawn equally, was because the rural counties were getting a highly disproportionate amount of representation. In California, Los Angeles County had only one state Senator, while several rural counties were distributed into several low population districts.

But the implication is that a Senate is suppose to be proportionate to population at all and the US Senate is most certainly not. It makes no sense that the court should create a double standard regarding the structure of a Senate within the Constitution, particularly when Article 1 endorses a Senate that is not proportional for the very reason of creating balance of interests. The Court completely abandoned that in 1962 and has thus created one problem in the solving of another.

Proportional representation is balanced... That's the point. Disproportionate representation is what is unbalanced. I mean, it depends on what you're trying to balance. States or people? The former was created by the latter, to serve the latter. Even Hobbes, the great champion of the State, put his argument in terms of what it could do for Man. Even the worst dictatorships set up a state only to serve some person(s), if only the dictator himself. In the United States, the states were created largely arbitrarily; they do not reflect any long standing religions, languages, ethnicities, or cultures; their only rational basis is the fact that they exist, as accidents of history. Human beings, on the other hand, are the basic building block of society and each have the same intrinsic moral worth merely by being human. It's no contest.

The Senate is not going to be abolished because the Constitution has made it impossible (and because it is politically out of the question), but let's not pretend there is any good reason for arbitrary representation "by state."

 You balance interests of different groups of people because a dictatorship of the simple 51% majority nationwide could also lead to division as interests specific to a particular region are ignored. Like agricultural issues in small states or hurricane preparedness along the Alantic coast.

But on what basis are we to define different "groups of people"? Why agricultural interests over say, physicians' interests or manufacturers' interests? And if that is the aim, why define it geographically? Why not set up a special protection for farmers? There are more farmers in upstate New York and Texas than in Idaho. Society is full of interests specific to small groups of people. Disabled people are less than 1% of the population. How are their interests to be represented? Should we carve out a Senate seat for them? Splitting things according to geography doesn't solve this problem. The geographic argument only makes sense if you think there is sone thing intrinsic in the land as currently apportioned among the states itself, that merits representation. Clearly there is not, nor is there any for state senate and house districts, which we redraw all the time.

It is not that you have to ensure every last group is represented, but that one group cannot dominate and control the others without having to join together with some other group. Thus is the source for the greater willing on the part of the Senate to compromise.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

It was a big mistake for the court to rule as it did with Reynolds back in the 1960's. The Senate is not designed to be OMOV and applying a different standard to the State Senate's on the basis of the 14th Amendment only serves to create a contradiction between Article 1 and the 14th amendment.

Illinois would be much better if it had a State Senate by county. As it is now the South and Central parts of the state's can litterally get crapped on and that will increasingly be the case now that Southern ILL is just as Republican as Central ILL and thus Democrats have no incentive to appeal to that region. Everett Dirksen warned about this back then regarding Illinois.

So... permanent Republican supermajorities in about 40 states' Senates?  Cute fantasy!

Where did I ever mention such should be extended to the lower house in those state's? I said the exact opposite just a few posts ago. The big states would have a split legislature forcing compromise and better policy outcomes and ending partisan gerrymandering.

I'm sure Delaware's state Senate would be tons of fun with its three members.

Where did I say Delware should be by county? I said Illinois, historically divided between two regions one of which has the power to dominate the other and cause its interests to be ignore would be better served with a legislature that balances the two regions (Chicago dominated House and Downstate dominated Senate).

Overall the decision should be left to those state's how best to structure their legislature provided at least one chamber is proportional to population.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

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Sure, but that has nothing to do with the rationality of apportioning votes equally according to state. The greater willingness of the Senate to compromise is largely a result of (1) the filibuster, which makes compromise necessary to pass most bills (2) the greater independence of individual Senators, who have larger individual power bases and are not totally at the mercy of the Leader, (3) to some extent, Senatorial tradition. It'll be interesting to see whether this survives the massive increase in polarization jfern posted. My guess is it won't, and we see it's already crumbling.

It is a relative equation, it will always be less polarized then the house.

The constituencies being as they are is what determines the independence of the Senators. Small state's can be outnumbered in a proportional system and desire to have the ability to force a compromise with the popular majority. You do not have that tradition in my view without the states being equally represented in the chamber.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Well you see we had to defeat Grover Cleveland.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

It was a big mistake for the court to rule as it did with Reynolds back in the 1960's. The Senate is not designed to be OMOV and applying a different standard to the State Senate's on the basis of the 14th Amendment only serves to create a contradiction between Article 1 and the 14th amendment.

Illinois would be much better if it had a State Senate by county. As it is now the South and Central parts of the state's can litterally get crapped on and that will increasingly be the case now that Southern ILL is just as Republican as Central ILL and thus Democrats have no incentive to appeal to that region. Everett Dirksen warned about this back then regarding Illinois.

So... permanent Republican supermajorities in about 40 states' Senates?  Cute fantasy!

Where did I ever mention such should be extended to the lower house in those state's? I said the exact opposite just a few posts ago. The big states would have a split legislature forcing compromise and better policy outcomes and ending partisan gerrymandering.

Where did I mention anything about extending it to the lower houses?!  Once again, your proposal would ensure permanent Republican majorities in most states' upper houses.  The unfortunate citizens of these states would flip back and forth between either total GOP control of both houses or split control between both parties.  I know that would be a GOP hack's wet dream, but for the rest of us it would be utterly appalling and completely ludicrous.

You really think the Republicans are capable of winning state house districts in Chicago and NYC (Manhattan NYC not quirky Queens wards, Hasidic Jews in Brooklyn or Staten Island NYC)? Or running the table literally everywhere else in those state's? And if the Republicans moved to become competative, the Democrats would counter to compete likewise down/upstate.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

What?  Are you even reading my responses?  Clearly you don't understand them, but I'm curious to see if you're actually even reading them.

Actually I was trying to get ahead of your arguements. Hence when you mentioned supermajority Senate's, I emphasized the lower houses being Democratically dominated. You then said they would flip back and forth between total GOP control and split, which implies the GOP is capable of doing what it has not done since 1972 in NY and what 1996/1998 in ILL.

You kept emphasizing that "GOP Hacks would love..." but I would imagine hacks in both parties would find themselves disappointed. What GOP hack would get off on a massive Senate majority, that is then powerless to do anything without that similarly massively Dem lower House going along? Very few.

You also mentioned "most states", but like I said a homogenous state has little need for this, nor would it change much from a partisan standpoint in TX, FL or CA, or most small states. So littearly this option is only relevant to a few states like ILL and NY. It would help the Democrats in SC and there are a number of GOP counties that would vote for a Democratic Senator in NC, probably half of all the counties when combined with the Democratic ones.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I'll never understand the fear mongering over this "tyranny of the 51%!" crap. I'm much more concerned with how a minority, from incredibly disproportionately represented areas, can utterly wreck a government without even making an effort, than I am for a properly elected and representative government functioning speedily.

Those arguments re: the Senate and the House make as much sense as when people get pissy about defending the Electoral College by saying "but then they'll just focus on the highest population areas! Only a few select states will get any attention!" even though a) this is bull****; a presidential candidate isn't just going to completely ignore entire regions unless he wants to ensure he turns people against him, and b) this is what happens now anyway. But I suppose that's a digression.

Conservatism, of the burkean variety, is founded on the notion that liberal democracy can just as easily be its own worst enemy and lead to the itself becoming a dictorship or an anarchy that then becomes a dictatorship once people cry out for stability and General Y comes riding in a horse to rescue the country. Therefore the popular will, whilst an importan facet of Republics, is necessarily one that must by checked by an opposing force or set of institutalionalized principles and structures.

You don't understand the motivation because you are a lefty, most lefties care not what means by which an objective is achieved and presume dangerously that such precedents will not be abused going forward. Therefore popular will can never be a malevolent force and yet yet the left has fought the end results of such (segregation and so forth) time and again. On the other hand, I would thought you of all people would understand the danger of the popular majority considering a certain string of a state constitutional amendments that were past over the last few cycles and means by which they are being systematically wiped out (Was that done mostly by popular majority or by one of those institutions slapping the popular majority down?).