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Indeed, our system was originally a "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon" sort, where if you didn't know him, you'd likely know someone who'd vouch for a House candidate
by hga 12y ago
Indeed, our system was originally a "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon" sort, where if you didn't know him, you'd likely know someone who'd vouch for a House candidate or Elector (who was vouching for the President); the Senate back then was elected by state legislatures to protect their interests.
It had obvious scaling problems, and the total number of districts was fixed at 435 in 1910 ... yeah, in the period where the GooGoos (Good Government) types were smashing most everything in sight about our system, like Senate elections. They sure improved things :-(.
- dllthomas 12y ago"the Senate back then was elected by state legislatures" I actually think this change was a large part of what led to consolidation of power at the federal level. If a citizen wanting X is deciding between Senate candidate A promising X, and B not promising X, why wouldn't they just pick candidate A? If a legislator is trying to decide between A and B, why wouldn't they just do X and keep the credit?