http://thirty-thousand.org/The House of Representatives was intended — by this nation’s founding fathers — to be a peoples’ house. How many of us would call it that today?
As is shown in this web pamphlet, the House of Representatives has devolved into a virtual oligarchy. Incumbents’ re-election rates currently exceed 95% and their average tenure in office is more than 10 years. Most alarming is the corrupting co-dependence between the elected officials and special interests, especially those that provide campaign financing. Perhaps even more insidious is the growing lack of faith in our government by the general public.
This web pamphlet attempts to demonstrate that the primary underlying cause for these adverse trends is increasingly oversized House districts. In 1804, a member of the House of Representatives represented, on average, 40 thousand citizens. Today, each Representative “represents” over 660 thousand people (on average). This trend is illustrated by the red graph in the chart below.
It's an interesting read. Any thoughts? The author makes a good point about how the House has grown so small as to NOT represent the people evenly.
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