this post was submitted on 03 Oct 2023
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I dont think that all the states should be equal precisely because they have vastly different populations. People talk about how unfair it is for California or Texas to drag other states kicking and screaming wherever they feel like but the opposite side of that coin isnt really any more fair.
I do agree that large and small states may need to be governed differently but thats something that needs to be addressed in a more direct way not by tipping the scales in favor of states with more grain silos and cows than people. i.e ground rules need to be set about how and why laws are constructed. i.e the real issue that the senate doesnt actually solve, is that laws aren't being rationally designed in a way that makes sense for the states that are subject to them. As long as that underlying issue isnt being directly addressed, the senate wont really fix things. And I would strongly argue that history proves that the senate is being used more as a political baseball bat than it is a tool of low population states to defend themselves.
Yeah, sure, but the solution to that isn't tipping the scales the other direction. Having the senate exist in the government as a check against the house is a measure to keep the scales from tipping in the first place. They already must work together to get anything done, and that means that the senate is just as beholden to the house as the house is to the senate. The proverbial scales will inevitably tip the other way if the legislative branch is reduced to just the house. If your goal is preventing the scales from tipping, that's not how you do it.
I think what you're really proposing is a restructuring of the legislative branch altogether, with maybe more law making power shifted to the states. Because just eliminating the senate and leaving the system how it is now would result in a heavily unbalanced legislature.
Anyway, nice discussing this with you. This isn't an easy topic, for what it's worth. It took a hundred men several months to hash out the details of what we're casually sitting here discussing.