The Bold Truth (2015) | Hacker News Reader

The Bold Truth (2015)

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11 pointsmaxwell7 comments

This has nothing to do with what was, or should be, the formula for determining the number of representatives. But I'm curious if this would work: the state with the smallest population gets 1 representative, and each doubling of population adds +1 more representative.

I'm using wikipedia for this, which should be close enough for a thought experiment. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_and_territ...

Wyoming has a population of roughly 576,851. It gets 1 representative. It's not until you get to Maine that it doubles, so they get 2. It doubles again at Kansas, so they get 3. The next doubling is Louisiana, so they get 4. New Jersey just barely makes it to 5. Finally New York tops out at 6. The grand total is 167 representatives.

This would create disproportionate representation for small states, the same way the senate does. E.g. Kansas has 4x the number of people but only 3x the number of reps as Wyoming.

Regardless of if everything they're claiming is true or not, the numbers just don't work out. Nobody will go for this. You have a better chance of getting a new amendment passed than getting TPTB (the powers that be) to sign up for this. Best of luck!

The heart of the argument is evidence that Connecticut voted for the amendment, but wasn't counted, back in 1790. It's not clear to me how substantial the evidence is, nor if this count should be corrected retroactively.

That would put about 7,000 representatives in the House. Which is already kind of a zoo.

The US House of Reps is nothing compared to the UK House of Commons:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kAM-YW-6vdU

It would also make it more difficult to play the partisan games going on now, as there would be a lot more cats to herd. And many many more viewpoints. There's much moer likelihood your rep is going to be a neighbor or someone you know rather than an interloper with deep pockets.

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