©rrk, February 4, 2003
The Senate’s Exclusive Affirmative Action
The problem with the electoral college is its unfairness in including two senatorial votes. If the count went strictly by the number of congressional districts it would closely align with the popular vote. For instance, in 2000, take away the 100 senate votes from the college and the result is changed even though the Republicans won in congressional seats. This aberration is owed to the predominant Republican senate seat bonus of the sparsely populated states — without this senate “affirmative action”, Gore would have won by fifteen electoral votes. However, it is not my intent to dredge up the election other than as a case in point.
Owing to the paranoia of the founding fathers’s distrust of the unwashed masses of the early industrial states, and those on the frontier, they adopted the bicameral system of Britain. Since technically there was no nobility — the psychology of Lords, nevertheless remained — it became the Senate to protect equal rights of states regardless of population. In these early days of relatively equal population, but for slavery, it supposedly did not matter that much. My argument is not with the senate per se; I agree with the authors of the Federalists in creating an additional legislative body with ostensibly greater experience and wisdom to pause for reflection before making laws.
Nor do I argue with there being two senators from each state to give it a greater cross-section voice, but I do disagree that their voices should be of equal weight with states of greater population. To preserve the dignity of a state with little population, it should be granted a single vote as they do for congressional districts with less than six hundred thousand. North Dakota, therefore, in spite of its low population should be entitled to no more than one vote in the Senate, not two. However, and puristically, a state with a population of one million or less requires its senate vote to be weighted as .033 by using California’s 30 million population as the reference point equaling two senate votes. If every state at the outset is given .033 weight for each million, the alignment would more closely reflect the population of the state. Alabama’s vote, therefore, would weigh in at 0.165, New York would weigh in at at0.59, Florida 0.50; Texas 0.66, Montana at .033.
Another alternative in keeping with the dignity of the state, is that each of the fifty states would be entitled to a single vote plus the .033 weight per million residents. In this way Alabama would weigh in at 1.165, New York at 1.59, Florida at 1.50. Texas at 1.66, Montana 1.033, and California at 3.
However, since there is something degrading — thanks to this scandalous subterfuge in the 1780s — about perceiving officials of a state as a fraction, each senate vote cast — and closer to the actual representation — should be valued as half the number of electoral votes entitled to the state, minus two [senators] . In other words, the total electoral college minus one hundred [437]would be the makeup for votes cast. Where a state has one Republican senator and one Democrat and they differ on a given issue the electoral vote is halved. For instance, Iowa has seven electoral votes, taking away the senate, leaves five; a Title I vote is pending on the senate floor, Grassley casts his 2.5 Nay; Harkin casts his 2.5 Yea. If North Dakota splits its vote that’s .5 for and .5 against. California, though seldom do Boxer and Feinstein disagree, they each would cast 26 votes[54-2].
If it is not broken why fix it, you say? But it is broken because it is on the edge of dominance by national minority. This is a nation of a unity of states, not separate states that are haphazardly united — the very flaw for which we criticize the UN. The principle of every vote counts is prima facie and must be protected; voters in Montana have no right to more importance than those of Florida; yet by adding two electoral votes to Montana’s one congressional seat, the overall congressional influence of the state is tripled! Add two to California and it is minuscule. Larger states by definition have more at stake in the direction the nation takes as is appropriately reflected by having more congressional districts, yet are are impeded by the undue importance of the senate of smaller states.
However grand the Constitution, at its birth it deliberately avoided slavery and ignored the “created equal” clause of the Declaration because in the Articles of Confederation there was protection for “servitude” which, out of the immense influence of plantation owners, had to be preserved and thus the equal vote inasmuch as census could not include millions of blacks. This scandal by minority weight took a most tragic war to regain the sanctity of the Constitution.
Outside the borders of a state there is rarely such a thing as state’s rights. A state has the right to responsible — not free — governance ultimately subject to the laws of the entire land just as the individual is entitled to self governance, not waywardness. A state has the right to its uniqueness within the law, but not to expect affirmative action that is actually instituted in behalf of the low population states. A state has the right to representation, not domination by the few.
Does this mean that there be a transformation of power so that a true majority dominates? Yes, actually, and why would anyone have a problem with that? Is this not a nation of checks and balances to prevent tyranny of the majority or minority? Though I personally may have thought that Reagan’s landslide was just that, I nonetheless accepted the law of the land and that I still had a congressional representative hopefully looking out for my needs. Still, if those needs are not met because the will of the majority thinks otherwise, so be it — there will be other elections. No one, however, can argue that this nation, for the sake of the mythical infallibility of the Constitution, ought to be ruled by the minority.
The senate floor was never intended to be a battleground for paranoidal state’s rights. Senators, assumed to be sober sages — some are but lackeys to their governors, legislative bodies, or lobbyists — view the nation as a whole and admittedly from an enlightened perspective of their respective states. The Constitution with its amendments protect the rights of every citizen, including the minority; the Senate — establishing or defending rights in general would be redundant — fosters the needs of states whether specific or by national law-making. And since it is a given that this nation is founded on government of the majority, it is time to begin....Alas, there may very well be a senator who admits to wielding unearned power and influence, but he or she is not suicidal.
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