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I have been wondering about this. Every state gets two senators representing the _entire state_, so you can’t gerrymander senate seats. I wonder if we need some

I have been wondering about this. Every state gets two senators representing the _entire state_, so you can’t gerrymander senate seats. I wonder if we need something similar for congressional districts, perhaps by allotting no less than two seats per district, which themselves are composed of one or more counties (the idea being county lines are not drawn by election boards).

stormbrew 4y ago
> the idea being county lines are not drawn by election boards Until they're important for elections... The house is screwed up largely because it's capped by a law passed a century ago. It's essentially impossible for it to be actually proportional with the current voter:representative ratio and districts being allocated along state lines.
- mbreese 4y ago
  Originally, the ratio was one representative for ~30,000 people. When the number was capped at 435 in 1929, the number of constituents for a representative was ~ 210,000. The current ratio is over 700,000. One could easily make an argument for geographic representation of 30,000 people. Those people should have a lot in common and have similar concerns. You could also make a good argument for 100k-200k people. However, 500k+ people cannot be properly represented by one voice in congress. If we had even the ratio of representation when the number was fixed (1:210,000), we'd have over 1500 members of Congress. https://history.house.gov/Institution/Origins-Development/Proportional-Representation/ https://history.house.gov/Institution/Origins-Development/Pr...
deleted 4y ago
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