this post was submitted on 19 Mar 2024
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It exists because there was a time when we needed buy in from states, not just people. The Senate was how that was accomplished.
It's a way of ensuring our democracy isn't too democratic.
You can understand the point of the Senate without thinking that we need to ensure that land is adequately represented in our government.
legislatively it makes sense. it removes a significant portion of say from large states, like texas and california, over small states like wyoming, who have comparatively little say. The trick is that it's application specific. Unless we're restructuring the entire government the senate does exist for a pretty explicit purpose.
I think it only makes sense if you think that it matters that Wyoming is fairly represented, and not the people in Wyoming.
I don't particularly care about the representation of the land, only the people who live on it, where each person should have as much say as any other.
The Senate is explicitly antidemocratic, and since I'm a fan of fair representation, I'm not a fan of the Senate.
Well, I suppose you could also make it so states get equal numbers of senators and representatives. That would also be fine, since there's a slight use for the Senate having a longer election cycle.
Since this whole thread is basically playing and dreaming, I'll easily agree that you can't just drop the Senate without at least giving a look at how that impacts the rest of the government organization.
it depends on the legislation. If it's something that the states are involved in, and it isn't particularly relevant to the people of the state like most legislation probably is. And in that scenario, it would be beneficial for wyoming to not be overshadowed by.
Also i dont think you understand how senate seats work, they're literally popular votes. We put them there. That's at least following the basic principles of democracy. I'm not sure how one would argue against that, unless you have a massive problem with the electoral college, would which would be fair i suppose.
This isn't a supreme court situation where they're appointed magically.