Congressional Reform Part 2 - The House of Representatives
Sorry for the long delay. But I'm back with my plans for Congressional Reform for the House of Representatives. In theory the concept of a body of representatives each representing a small district of about 700,000 people should work and be fully democratic. However, the current House is far from that. This is most notably do to gerrymandering or partisan redistricting. Creating the weirdest shape districts that divide local communities just so that the people in power stay in power. Google the Ohio 11th, Maryland 3rd, and Texas 35th districts. This is an undemocratic practice because it does not allow for political change in addition to not letting communities pick a representative for themselves. Gerrymandering also lets districts be divided racially which is unconstitutional according to the federal courts that made Florida, Virginia, and North Carolina change their districts in 2016. Another issue with the current House of Representatives is that it under represents the urban majority of the current America. Even though there are typically huge margins of victory in urban districts the urban majority only gets to elect one representative while the rural minority has smaller margins of victory but there are a lot more rural majority districts than urban majority districts. The Democratic party the one generally preferred by people living in urban areas suffers by this principle. On the generic ballot as a whole the Democratic Party needs to beat the Republican Party by about five percentage points to even have a shot at winning the house. This shows that the current House of Representatives gives an undeniable large advantage to America's rural minority.
To solve both of the major issues with the current House (Gerrymandering and Underrepresentation) here is my plan:
Step 1: Change the number of representatives per each congressional district from one to two and in elections let the top two candidates be elected. There will still be 345 total voting representatives. State's with only one representative in total will still only elect one representative per district. This would solve the major issue of under representation of America's urban population by disregarding the margin barrier and letting district's that vote overwhelmingly vote for Democrats or Republicans not waste the margin of victory to have two representatives. It would also in toss up districts it would allow most people to be represented by someone they agree ideologically with, whether it is a Democrat or Republican. The minority in each district would still get a vote.
Step 2: The Supreme Court of the United States will decide each state's congressional district map. This step is taken to eliminate the system of political gerrymandering. By letting the supreme court the most impartial body in the country decide each state's congressional districts it would end the gerrymandering problem.
Step 3: Abolish Primaries for all House of Representative elections. If the top two finishers in the election get elected anyways why should there be primaries for two candidates or even three or four candidates. The whole point of this system is to elect the top two candidates without partisan affiliation.
By letting each congressional district elect it's top two vote getters and having the Supreme Court draw each state's congressional map, more people not just the majorities will be represented in the House. Also, neither political party would have to win the total vote by large margins just to gain a congressional majority. I redistricted every single state with more than one district primarily along county, municipal, and neighborhood lines a prediction of what the Supreme Court would do if they were the ones drawing the congressional maps:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1QIm5BfpMtDK2ilQTytoIc8PeswJkxdhO?usp=sharing
Here's the link to the power point if you need a visual:
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1RBeAhCkWzNpwkATnH8WNcjA6wE6E17rDwqf_exz8GDM/edit?usp=sharing
Next post is primary reform!
To solve both of the major issues with the current House (Gerrymandering and Underrepresentation) here is my plan:
Step 1: Change the number of representatives per each congressional district from one to two and in elections let the top two candidates be elected. There will still be 345 total voting representatives. State's with only one representative in total will still only elect one representative per district. This would solve the major issue of under representation of America's urban population by disregarding the margin barrier and letting district's that vote overwhelmingly vote for Democrats or Republicans not waste the margin of victory to have two representatives. It would also in toss up districts it would allow most people to be represented by someone they agree ideologically with, whether it is a Democrat or Republican. The minority in each district would still get a vote.
Step 2: The Supreme Court of the United States will decide each state's congressional district map. This step is taken to eliminate the system of political gerrymandering. By letting the supreme court the most impartial body in the country decide each state's congressional districts it would end the gerrymandering problem.
Step 3: Abolish Primaries for all House of Representative elections. If the top two finishers in the election get elected anyways why should there be primaries for two candidates or even three or four candidates. The whole point of this system is to elect the top two candidates without partisan affiliation.
By letting each congressional district elect it's top two vote getters and having the Supreme Court draw each state's congressional map, more people not just the majorities will be represented in the House. Also, neither political party would have to win the total vote by large margins just to gain a congressional majority. I redistricted every single state with more than one district primarily along county, municipal, and neighborhood lines a prediction of what the Supreme Court would do if they were the ones drawing the congressional maps:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1QIm5BfpMtDK2ilQTytoIc8PeswJkxdhO?usp=sharing
Here's the link to the power point if you need a visual:
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1RBeAhCkWzNpwkATnH8WNcjA6wE6E17rDwqf_exz8GDM/edit?usp=sharing
Next post is primary reform!
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