For several years I have been asking former colleagues in the House of Representatives, "Why are there 435 members in the House?" They usually respond with a shrug or a brusque laugh and say, "Okay, you must know. Tell me." The number of congressional members is not mandated by the Constitution. Nor does the size of congressional districts announced in the document. The number 435 was adopted in 1929, and it was a number driven by racism, xenophobia, and the cocky-interest of members. Even so it could all change with an act of Congress.

The Framers of the Constitution believed the "people's branch" of authorities—the House—should grow in size as the population grew, thereby guaranteeing the people admission to their elected representatives. The offset Congress in 1789 had districts of 33,000 constituents; today's districts have 740,000. Districts need to exist smaller, and the membership of the Business firm larger. That alter in law would eliminate a ninety-year monument to bigotry, make the House more than democratic, and brand the Balloter College more representative of the population of our country. Smaller districts, accompanied by redistricting and electoral reform, will also create more than competitive districts, which volition mean less virulently partisan candidates—and, hopefully, legislators. Republican candidates running in cities and the suburbs will observe it difficult to be xenophobic or to oppose reproductive rights and action on climate change. Meanwhile, Democrats in rural areas will be like the Southern Democrats I served with in the House in the 1970s and '80s: pro-concern, pro-life, merely also pro-civil rights. This may not finish political polarization, but information technology is a vital first step in reforming the Business firm.

Information technology Started in Philadelphia

The reply to "Why 435" starts with the Ramble Convention of 1787 and three contentious problems regarding the creation of the Senate and the House: the composition of the Senate; whether and how to count the enslaved population; and the size of the congressional districts.

On the first matter, James Madison had strenuously argued for proportional representation in both bodies. He believed this was essential for a strong national government. The mid-Atlantic modest states—Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland, and New Jersey—were obdurate: equal representation in the Senate or goose egg.

The second issue was how to count enslaved persons. In 1783, the Congress, desperate for revenue, sought to impose a per-land levy based on population, which raised the result of whether and how to count the enslaved. The Southern states argued against the counting of any slaves considering it would keep their revenue contribution lower; the Northern members wanted to count all slaves. Madison proposed a three-fifths compromise for revenue purposes—3 out of every five of the enslaved population would be counted. Four years later, during the Ramble Convention, the issue of how to count enslaved persons arose again. This time the effect was not revenue only representation, and the positions of the North and Due south were reversed. Past 1787, enslaved persons made up about forty pct of the populations of Maryland and the Southern states. Those states wanted to count enslaved persons in the aforementioned as "free people." Some Northern states, concerned that the Southern states would "import slaves" to increase their population and thus their number of representatives, argued that no enslaved persons should be counted. Still others argued for some other iii-fifths dominion—three of every five enslaved persons would be counted.

Finally, they had to make up one's mind on the number of people that constituted a congressional district—and thus the size of the House of Representatives. The just time George Washington, the convention'due south chairman, spoke was to argue for smaller districts of 30,000 persons versus the leading alternative of twoscore,000 persons.

The second matter was settled first, when, in June 1787, the three-fifths rule was agreed to. In July, the "Great Compromise" passed 5-4, and small states were guaranteed equal representation in the Senate and proportional representation in the House. Finally, on the last day of the convention, September 17, Washington's smaller district option was adopted.

The debate on the first matter, the size of the Firm, remained contentious during the state ramble ratifying conventions, with states arguing for more members to improve constituents' admission to them too equally a ways to prevent corruption. In 1789, James Madison, then running for a Business firm seat, had written a campaign letter to the voters of his district promising them a "bill of rights" and a requirement to increase the size of the House. These amendments were the most important issues in his campaign for Congress confronting James Monroe, his opponent and then and, 28 years afterwards, his successor to the presidency. He defeated Monroe 1,308 to 972. Yes, the districts where much smaller then. Lesson learned, Congressman Madison went to New York as member of the First Congress and authored a series of amendments at present known equally the Bill of Rights. His proposed Kickoff Amendment was a guarantee that the House would begin with a defined number of members—which was non included in the Constitution—and would grow co-ordinate to a specific formula laid out in the amendment. It fell curt of ratification by one country. Had information technology been ratified, the freedoms we at present savour every bit part of the Showtime Amendment, including oral communication and the press, would accept been the Second Amendment.

The 1920 Census: White, Rural America Reacts

For the side by side 120 years, from 1790-1910, membership in the House of Representatives grew equally the population increased and as new states were admitted to the Matrimony—with the exception of 1840, when the Congress reduced the size of the Firm membership. The Reapportionment Deed of 1911 increased House membership from 386 to 433 and allowed a new member each from the Arizona and the New Mexico territories when they joined the Spousal relationship. In 1912, Fenway Park opened, the Titanic sank, and the Firm had 435 members. Fenway Park has changed, bounding main liners are ancient history—but the House still has the same number of representatives today as it did then, even every bit the population has more tripled—from 92 one thousand thousand to 325 one thousand thousand.

Later the 1920 Census determined that more Americans lived in cities than in the rural areas, a nativist Congress with a racist Southern core faced its decennial responsibleness of reapportioning a country that had experienced a large growth in immigrants. The population had grown in x years by 15 per centum, to 106 one thousand thousand. Recent immigrants lived in vibrant enclaves with their beau countrymen. They spoke their mother tongues, shopped at ethnic stores and markets, partied at ethnic clubs, and attended ethnic plays and movies. While 85 percent of Americans were native born, House members debating the effects of the Census routinely referred to the large cities as "foreign" and too much like the "sometime earth." In 1921 and 1924, Congress passed anti-immigration legislation, the second establishing a "national origins formula" that severely restricted clearing from Southern and Eastern Europe. Earlier anti-inclusion acts had already restricted clearing from Asia.

The congressional hearings held after that 1920 Census exposed the country'south racial separation and its urban-rural divide. The Business firm Census Committee's first hearing included African-American witnesses James Weldon Johnson and Walter White of the NAACP, Monroe Trotter from the National Equal Rights League, and George H. Harvey, general counsel of the Colored Quango of Washington, who detailed the systematic discrimination confronting black voting. White testified that anyone helping blacks vote in certain Florida communities would be "subjected to mob violence." The console demanded that Congress use the Fourteenth Amendment's provisions—specifically Section 2, which deals with apportionment and representation matters—to reduce a state's congressional delegation as a penalty for denying its citizens the right to vote.

The Southerners on the committee, offended by the African Americans' presence, rejected the testify of discrimination. Representative William Larsen, Democrat of Georgia, said: "In my home, ane,365, I believe is the number, n——-southward are registered. . . . Nosotros have a white primary, which has nothing to practice with the general ballot. The n——— does not participate in the white primary." He explained that blacks cull not to vote in the full general election because their party—the Republican Party—"lacked the strength to win," equally historian Charles Due west. Eagles put it.

Meanwhile, every bit Congress debated how to reapportion the country, women got the right to vote, and alcohol was banned. Though Globe War I brought the country together, the end of the state of war brought 2 years of a "ruddy scare" in which labor unions and "dissenters" of all types were harassed, jailed, and deported by Woodrow Wilson'due south fanatical Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer, who feared the spread of Soviet-style Communism.

By 1924, the Ku Klux Klan had 4 million members. The Klan was organized, lethal, and quickly expanding to the West and Midwest. This "second ascension" of the Klan had begun in 1915, and its membership was anti-black, anti-Catholic, anti-Semitic, anti-immigrant, and pro-Prohibition. In the South, the Klan was Democratic, in the West and Midwest it was Republican, and everywhere its members saw a land where white Protestants were losing power and immigrants were ascendant.

In 1929, having failed to concur on how to account for the growth in the country's population, the Business firm prepare by law the number of members at 435, or the 1912 level. Keeping the number at 435 ensured that Congress would not recognize the changes brought about by the African-American migration and the immigrant population growth in the Northern, Midwestern, and Western cities. The South and rural America, which dominated the House, rejoiced. At the terminal infinitesimal, the Republican authors of the bill removed a decades-long requirement that districts be meaty, contiguous, and of equal population. The states were now gratuitous to draw districts of varying sizes and shapes, or to elect their representatives at large. (At-big representation had really existed before, at the beginning of the commonwealth, but was made illegal over the course of the nineteenth century.)

A Century-Plus Later, It's Fourth dimension for Change

No 1 would accept imagined that the racist, anti-urban, arbitrary number of 435 would last, unchanged, for 108 years. Certainly not the Framers of the Constitution, who believed that the House should grow with each decennial Census. The "bargain" of 1929 that fixed the House at 435 members has immune the boilerplate size of a congressional district to abound from 230,000 people to approximately 780,000 in 2020. Communication with constituents today is more and more electronic than personal. Some members still practise in-person boondocks halls, though social media makes organizing to disrupt them easy. As the districts abound in size, the likelihood of having personal contact with House members diminishes.

During my 18 years in Congress, the thousands of unscripted, oft poignant, crazy, and contentious moments with my constituents shaped me and gave them a run a risk to take my measure. Today, members and their constituents can instantaneously communicate with each other, only a digital presence is no substitute for the existent thing. Information technology is like watching Quaternary of July fireworks on your iPhone.

And then what to do? I advise we practice what the Founding Fathers idea made sense: Increment the size of the House of Representatives as the population grows so that it tin become representative of the people once again. I in one case raised the idea of increasing the size of the House with a prominent member. The response did not surprise me: "Oh, they don't like 435 of us now. Surely they won't like more of us." Probably true if the event is presented solely equally increasing the size of an already extremely unpopular and little-trusted institution. But what if the argument is not just about more members, simply rather smaller and more representative districts and greater denizen access to their members? And what if the outcome is a more diverse group of representatives and even, perchance, a reduction in the polarization that paralyzes Congress today?

The first question is, what is the correct size of an expanded Business firm? The Wyoming Rule provides one model for how to determine the size of new districts. It would decrease the number of people in a congressional district to the "everyman standard unit of measurement." The Constitution provides that each land is entitled to at least one representative. Wyoming beingness currently the least populous state, its population (577,000) would be used to decide the "lowest standard unit," which would then be the number of people in each congressional district across the land. To make up one's mind how many total members, the population of the country is divided by the "lowest standard unit of measurement."

In 2020, the U.S. population is estimated to exist 330-plus one thousand thousand. Wyoming's population is likely to be shut to what information technology is today. That would mean congressional districts of approximately 577,000 or so people. Not exactly small simply significantly improve than the 780,000 it is likely to be in 2020. The number of members in the Firm would increase by 142, from 435 to 577. Big enough to make a difference, but without being unwieldy. The Wyoming dominion has the virtue of requiring merely a statutory change.

So size is the first question. Simply it is not the only question. We besides demand to talk most how to expand the House. The thought of increasing the size of the House without the necessary electoral reforms would merely exacerbate the absurd outcomes nosotros see in states similar North Carolina, where 50 percent of the votes cast in the 2022 election were for Autonomous candidates withal Republicans won 10 of the state's 13 House seats. Similar instances of gerrymandering in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania are being challenged in country courts. There is no excuse for allowing either Democrats or Republicans to appoint in partisan redistricting. Last June, the Supreme Court ruled 5-iv in Rucho five. Mutual Cause that "partisan gerrymandering claims nowadays political questions beyond the reach of the federal courts"—a shameful dereliction of the Court'south responsibleness to protect the rights of all Americans to, as the minority wrote, "participate as in the political process." The Rucho decision is a render to 1940s Supreme Court reasoning that electoral questions are all-time left to the political sphere, which the Courtroom had overcome by 1962, when it ruled in Baker v. Carr that such political questions were indeed within the Court's purview. While we expect for legislative activity, former Chaser General Eric Holder's National Democratic Redistricting Committee has vigorously fought a state-by-land boxing to insure that the 2022 redistricting maps are nonpartisan. In North Carolina, the group'south efforts were successful recently when a three-judge panel ruled that new nonpartisan districts must replace the Republican gerrymandered program.

How do we go on simultaneously to expand and reform? There are several thoughtful plans that could frame the debate. The place to showtime is a packet of election and voting reforms introduced past Maryland Autonomous Congressman John Sarbanes that includes a provision for nonpartisan commissions in the states to examine how to draw district lines fairly. Information technology passed the House in March, but Senate Majority Leader McConnell, unsurprisingly, will non bring it up in the Senate.

Some other possible alter would be to give states the option to take some number of the added congressional seats and take them elected "at-large" on a statewide basis. Electing some members statewide volition result in greater voter participation and more competitive Business firm races, which is likely to mean fewer farthermost candidates. Here's how it might work. After the Census, in states receiving additional seats, parties would advance a listing of statewide candidates. The total number of votes cast for all the Democrats and Republicans running in the state's individual district races would be tallied to determine which political party's at-large candidates would be elected. Then, for example, if the votes cast for Democrats running in all of the district races amounted to 60 percent of the full statewide vote—Democrats would receive 60 pct of the at-big seats, and the Republicans would go forty percentage. The at-large concept is more than nuanced than this case and is most likely to make sense in more than populated states. Many states will not authorize for an at-big seat, and some volition get only 1 or two seats, but fifty-fifty in those instances in that location would be a stiff incentive to maximize individual district turnout; at-big/statewide elections will bulldoze both parties to field candidates in every district in an effort to run upwards the statewide voting totals. The days of candidates running unopposed would exist over. Fifty-fifty in the districts that were overwhelmingly Autonomous, the Republicans would still want to field a serious candidate to increment their aggregate statewide vote full. The same would be true for Democrats in potent Republican areas.

More than competition for every seat will have a moderating effect on both parties. In society to be constructive in maximizing their vote, parties will have to field candidates who appeal to more than than a narrow ideological base of operations. In a further effort to drive upward turnout the parties might want to field at-large candidates of prominence: Arnold Schwarzenegger in California, Beto O'Rouke in Texas, Andrew Gillum in Florida, Michael Bloomberg and Shepard Smith in New York, Ashley Judd in Kentucky, and Madeleine Albright in Virginia.

Don't Forget the Balloter College

Increasing the total number of House members would besides increase the size of the Balloter College by approximately 142, from 538 to 680 members.

What impact would this take? In sum, the more than populated states would increase their number of Electoral Higher votes significantly. Consider a comparison of Wyoming and Florida. Today, Wyoming, with a population of 577,000, gets iii electoral votes—i electoral vote per 193,000 people. Florida, meanwhile, with a population of 21.3 million, gets 29 electors—one electoral vote for every 734,500 people. But if congressional districts were reduced from 720,000 people to 577,000, Florida would grow to 37 congressional districts, and 39 electors, while Wyoming would still have simply the 3. Ohio would go 4 more congressional seats, and Michigan three more. The big winners of class would be California with 16 more seats and Texas with 15. This would translate into 71 electoral votes for California and 53 for Texas.

Of form, the pocket-sized states would hate this. But the Electoral College has given pocket-sized states asymmetric power throughout our history. As well, of course, slave states, in the commencement: The three-fifths compromise for counting enslaved people adopted at the Constitutional Convention gave the S more than Electoral Higher votes, which resulted in five of the first six presidents being from Virginia. All v were slaveholders.

A ramble amendment to abolish the Electoral Higher would exist the best way to proceed, only information technology'south extremely unlikely. Increasing the size of the Balloter College would reduce the small-state advantage. The large and growing states—Florida, Texas, California, other Lord's day Belt states—will go more important to the outcome of the presidential election. Whether this increase in the larger states volition favor 1 party over the other is not clear, but the means by which nosotros elect a President will certainly exist more representative of the population. And, of course, Nate Silver will have to modify the name of his website.

Time for a Argue

For 140 years, the right size of congressional districts was hotly debated. Yet we haven't had a serious argue on the size of House districts in 90 years, during which time the land's population has more than than tripled. The stasis has left us an outlier amidst representative democracies. U.S. House districts are gigantic compared to "lower house" constituencies in Europe. Great Britain'south House of Commons has 650 members, each representing nearly 110,000 people. France's Bedchamber of Deputies is 577, Germany'south Bundestag is 709; both, well-nigh 100,000-plus people per constituency. The Japanese Diet's lower house with 465 members is the side by side closest in size to the U.South. House, only its districts are much smaller, with about 272,000 people.

The Framers recognized that the population would grow and the land would change. The population has tripled since 1910, the demographic makeup of our country has changed, but that change is not matched in the makeup of the congressional membership. Co-ordinate to the Pew Enquiry Center, in 2017, whites deemed for 81 percent of Congress but merely 62 percent of the population. In the 2022 Congress, women make upward twenty percent of the membership, despite being just more than than half the population. In the last 5 decades, the Hispanic population increased more than fivefold. Even so the percentage of Hispanics in Congress, while it has grown, is even so simply shy of 8 percent. Expanding the House gives u.s.a. a chance to have a legislative co-operative that is representative of the people in more than ways than one.

Many have said to me that the idea of more members is simply crazy. Simply what is truly crazy, sad, and inarguably objectionable is that a racist, nativist congressional determination of 90 years ago still stands. Four hundred and thirty-v members is tantamount to a Confederate Battle Flag of numbers hiding in plain sight. Patently at that place is no real understanding of the Framers' intent that Business firm districts abound in number as the population increases. Where are the "strict constructionists" when nosotros actually need them? While we debate what questions to ask on the next Census form, in that location appears to exist piddling recognition that the purpose of Article 1, Section 2 of the Constitution was to determine the size of a growing Business firm of Representatives.

Congress will not decrease the size of districts without a fight, of grade. Why would any fellow member want to dilute his or her private ability and potency? Simply for democracy to work, democratic institutions must accept the trust and support of the people. The Framers promised a people'due south Firm. Information technology is fourth dimension to honor that promise. Congress owes it to the American people to revisit the decision of 435 made 108 years ago and adopted into constabulary xc years ago.

Visit your fellow member of Congress, ask them why there are 435 members of the House; since yous at present know, you could brainwash them and the process of reform can begin.