8%, made a mistake A WHOPPING 400+ % discrepancy in representation in comp to the respective states populations
The Senate was never meant to have representation proportionate to the population. The original 13 states had House delegations of varying size but equal Senate representation. This was a requirement to get smaller population states to agree to join the Union. It is also the system under which every state has joined the United States. You cannot change the rules after you start the game unless everyone agrees to the new rules (or everyone agreed to a system to change the rules). If you want to change the composition of the Senate it will take a Constitutional Amendment, and good luck getting 38 states to agree to cede their power in the Senate to California.
I'm not disagreeing that it's the system we have, that it was created with an intent, and that it would be very hard to change Just saying it makes for a lousy democracy when such a huge population of the country is unequally represented to such an extreme degree. Roughly 2.5 million Americans have equal representation in passing laws with that of over 110 million Americans, which is insane and a terrible foundation for democracy in today's USA, amongst other things.
Of course not, because it is an obvious truth. The Senate was never meant to be proportional, and that is not a flaw. The house is apportioned by population. That is the democratic institution. The Senate represents the states. It is neither insane nor a terrible foundation. It is a balance against the more democratic house. Again, there would be no United States without the Senate, because the small population states would not have agreed to join the Union. The Senate and the electoral college and the Constitution are what allowed for states with radically different populations to create a nation. Rhode Island or Georgia or Delaware would not have agreed to create the United States if their votes would be totally swamped by Virginia, Massachusetts, and Pennsylvania. Virginia had 10 House Representatives in the first Congress. Delaware had 1. The Senate is what allows small population states to have any say at all in the running of the country, any they wouldn't agree to join up if it didn't exist.
We agree here, that the house (despite having its own fair share of issues) is the much more democratic body between the two. The Senate was never intended to be a democratic body for the people of the US, it's a form of representation for the territorial outlines within the country. Disagree with this, for today's country at least. Agree, but I do take it we have different feelings on this function, which is ok.
Again it is very unlikely anytime soon that the Senate will be abolished. It will take a major change of the Constitution and I'm pretty certain that an actual attempt to will likely lead to civil war. Also while Democrats / Progressives are frustrated by the Senate doing away with it might not be the solution they want if they lose Senators like Sanders, Coons and Murphy from small blue states. At the sametime populations are growing in red and red leaning states like TX, FL, and AZ. Given how gerrrymandered those states are the balance of power in Congress could shift decisively to Republicans.
