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Level the playing field by getting involved in races beyond your district [1]
['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']
Date: 2023-09-15
We are not a conservative country but conservative politics are baked into our core through comprises made during the Constitutional Convention. To get small, low populated states to support the Constitution, the Convention adopted a compromise which gave each state 2 senators and allocated a fixed number of congressional seats among the states based on their populations. Under this system, the low population, rural states get a disproportionate share of Congressional seats as each state gets 2 senators no matter their population size. As the Electoral College is based on Congressional seats, the rural states also get a disproportionate share of electors.
One way to partially level the voting playing field is to get involved in Congressional races beyond your own district. Although people can only vote in the district in which they live, they can donate anywhere. By donating to races beyond your district, you expand your influence. A donation does not equal a vote but it can influence one.
If you live in Wyoming, the least populated state with, 577,605 people as of July, 2022, your vote in the Senate is worth over 90 times more than the vote of someone who lives in California. California is the most populated state, with 39,029,342 people as of July, 2022. That is, California’s population is 90 times greater than Wyoming’s, yet they only get two Senators. The imbalance of power in the Senate is partially mitigated by the number of House seats allocated to each state. House seat are allocated roughly proportional to population but as there can only be 435 representatives, there is still variation in the number of people each House member represents.
Exhibit 1 shows the states’ populations as of 2022 in terms of their representation in Congress and their electoral votes. For example, Alabama has a population of 5,074,296. They have 7 House seats, 2 Senators, and 9 electoral votes. Each of their electoral votes represent 563,811 individuals while their House Members, on average, represent 724,899 people, and their Senators represent an average of 2,537,148 people. Relative to the national averages at the bottom of the chart, Alabama has fewer people per representative in each category. This means residents of Alabama have greater voting power that the average. All the cases in which the population per representative is below the average, giving citizens above average voting power, are bolded in the chart. There are 39 states that have above average Electoral College representation. Those states are highlighted in the first column by color based on if they are alignmed with the Republicans (18 states shaded red) or Democrats (12 states shaded blue). One state that both parties won in the past 3 Presidential elections is shaded in tan.
Our very strange method of voting, tilts the playing field to primary rural, low population states which tend to be Republican. How do we counter this? Fixing the Constitution is not a realistic possibility in the near future. One way to lessen the imbalance is to get involved in races beyond your district. You cannot vote in those races but you can volunteer and you can donate and influence the voters in those districts.
There are numerous organizations that are targeting seats to maintain and flip to win majorities in the House and Senate. DONATE, GET INVOLVED, BE STRATEGIC
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https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/9/15/2192845/-Level-the-playing-field-by-getting-involved-in-races-beyond-your-district
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