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The US House of Representatives

Stu

Stu

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The US House of Representatives has, for the last half century been functioning primarily to extend the power of the majority party. There are lots of folks out there with ideas on how to make it more responsive to the public. It is fascinating that the membership was slowed over time and then capped.

Here is one idea on changing it. There are lots of them but none seem to gain much traction.

The framers of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights intended that the total population of Congressional districts never exceed 50 to 60 thousand. Currently, the average population size of the districts is nearly 700,000 and, consequently, the principle of proportionally equitable representation has been abandoned
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http://www.thirty-thousand.org/
 
Interesting considering I doubt they ever took into account how large the population would become in 300 years. Maybe they did but I doubt it.
 
Eventhorizon said:
Interesting considering I doubt they ever took into account how large the population would become in 300 years. Maybe they did but I doubt it.
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They make an interesting point, they say that the US House decided to increase their staff rather than increase the number of representative.
If elected members only had to answer to 50,000 individuals, they would spend less time raising money to get reelected and more time reading the laws on which they vote.
 
Stu said:
They make an interesting point, they say that the US House decided to increase their staff rather than increase the number of representative.
If elected members only had to answer to 50,000 individuals, they would spend less time raising money to get reelected and more time reading the laws on which they vote.
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Yeah. It seems like it should be mandatory to read and understand something before you vote on it. Its actually kind of mind boggling they arent held accountable for that. It kind of makes me want to introduce a bill and hide somewhere in the fine writing they must all refer to each other as dumbass or something of the like.
 
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they also make a point of saying that when you are appealing to the majority of 700,000 people your ability to obfuscate and seem to agree with people works to your advantage, but appealing to a smaller group makes this more difficult
 
This gets even better
One man, a self-described “Democratic-Republican,” has filed suit in federal court to prove that such a scenario did indeed take place and that Article the First (the first of the 12 proposed amendments, 10 of which became the Bill of Rights) should be accepted as the constitutional law of the land.
First a bit of background. Article the First was the first of the slate of 12 proposed amendments passed by the House and Senate and sent to the states for ratification. Article the First deals with the proportioning of the number of representatives in the House of Representatives.
In correspondence sent to this author, Frederick John LaVergne recounted events that he claims offer credible evidence of the ratification by the requisite number of states of one of those two originally rejected proposed amendments

In the fall of 2011, the ratification records of Connecticut and Kentucky as concerns the “Articles of Amendment” – what we, today, refer to as “The Bill of Rights”, were discovered hidden away in the drawers of the archives of those States.
In BOTH cases, the documents clearly demonstrate that “Article the First” had been passed in the affirmative by the Legislatures of those States, even though the US Government and history say they didn't. We can now prove different. [Emphasis in original.]
By ANY counting, that meant that 12 of the then 15 States voted to ratify “Article the First”. [Emphasis in original.]
To become a part of the Constitution, an amendment must pass 75% of the States’ Legislatures. 12 of 15 are 80% – clearly over the 75% threshold.
Therefore, “Article the First” has been the law of the land for over 220 years.
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http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnew...-ignoring-an-amendment-ratified-by-the-states
 
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Also referred to as a congressman or congresswoman, each representative is elected to a two-year term serving the people of a specific congressional district. Among other duties, representatives introduce bills and resolutions, offer amendments and serve on committees. The number of representatives with full voting rights is 435, a number set by Public Law 62-5 on August 8, 1911, and in effect since 1913. The number of representatives per state is proportionate to population.

As outlined in the Constitution, the House represents citizens based on district populations, while the Senate represents citizens on an equal state basis. This agreement was part of what is called The Great Compromise which, in turn, led to the Permanent Seat of Government Actestablishing the nation’s federal capital in Washington, DC. In 1789, the House assembled for the first time in New York. It moved to Philadelphia in 1790 and then to Washington, DC, in 1800.

http://www.house.gov/
 
I can't imagine twenty times this number of Representatives meeting and trying to accomplish something.
 
just me said:
I can't imagine twenty times this number of Representatives meeting and trying to accomplish something.
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Like they are getting so much done now, and look at the Senate with its 100 members and it is not functional either.
 
Don't lobby groups bridge the gap between particular interests and reps./senators?

Perhaps each rep. could have locally elected advisory committee members - like town/city mayors having an auxiliary federal advisory function?
 
Flavus Aquila said:
Don't lobby groups bridge the gap between particular interests and reps./senators?

Perhaps each rep. could have locally elected advisory committee members - like town/city mayors having an auxiliary federal advisory function?
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That would probably make it even easier to play silly political games and ignore people.

They already know what their people want. That comes in handy when you're redrawing districts for gerrymandering.
 
Also they're not all out for themselves either. They team up for mutual reelections. You think they want to change that?
 
None of the representatives are doing anything for the people they are supposed to be representing. All of look around and think "who voted for that???" No one but the representative did and they in turn say "well...it was part of the bill I did not like but to get the part I did like, I had to vote for both."
 
If it's been like this for a long time, and people keep reelecting them, then the current situation must be what the majority want. The public always deserves the government it elects.
 
I find it quite interesting when reading email bulletins from my Senator, etc. Most people don't take the time to see what they are actually doing...
 
Flavus Aquila said:
A similar thing goes on here, but obviously at a much smaller scale.

I got the impression that the problem was effective representation, regardless of the political party/ideology.
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Representation is a problem, but the bigger problem is that both sides are in cahoots to some extent. This is why they so often get away with bipartisan gerrymandering because both parties benefit from it - e.g. Democrats might turn a blind eye to Republican gerrymandering because they get a guaranteed piece of it.
 
sprinkles said:
Representation is a problem, but the bigger problem is that both sides are in cahoots to some extent. This is why they so often get away with bipartisan gerrymandering because both parties benefit from it - e.g. Democrats might turn a blind eye to Republican gerrymandering because they get a guaranteed piece of it.
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Ok, so what's the solution?

Why not vote for candidates/independent candidates that oppose these current mores? Are there other political parties?
 
Flavus Aquila said:
Ok, so what's the solution?

Why not vote for candidates/independent candidates that oppose these current mores? Are there other political parties?
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The incumbent parties are the ones who nominate candidates and we have no federal rulings on ballot access when it comes to electing for the House.

Third parties are technically possible depending on the state but in practice, people don't really have a choice who ends up on the ballot.
 
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