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Comment by kelnos | Hacker News Reader

> The senate system of 2 senators per state and the electoral college are fantastic features to provide additional stability across a vast and diverse geography.

It's interesting that you see it that way. From my perspective, it's something that was originally designed with fairly good intentions, that is now being abused by the minority to impose their will upon everyone.

Let's not forget that Democrats have won the popular vote in all but one presidential election this century. And that the Senate's structure has allowed the party representing a minority of Americans to reshape the federal judiciary for years to come. (And unless a rabbit gets pulled out of a hat somewhere, they'll still have outsized control over judicial confirmations for at least the next 2 years.)

I'm all for preventing the tyranny of the majority, but these features of US government haven't resulted in moderation, they've resulted in tyranny of the minority.

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> "I'm all for preventing the tyranny of the majority, but these features of US government haven't resulted in moderation, they've resulted in tyranny of the minority."

The alternative is effectively disenfranchising rural areas. Remember that whole "no taxation without representation" thing a couple of centuries ago and how badly that turned out? Rural areas are where all the food, agricultural and mineral resources of the United States are produced, not to mention the source of the majority of its armed forces, so trying to disenfranchise them isn't going to end well.

And the minority isn't small either: the last time I checked, even in archetypically left-leaning California, about 1/3 of the vote went to Trump; for the other two west coast states, the tally was closer to 40%.

The answer, of course, is to focus on uniting the nation, not division, even if it means not all the changes people want happen as quickly as they would prefer. "Politics is the art of the possible" after all.

Rural areas are not disenfranchised in the House though. If anything they're still over-represented because the House hasn't been allowed to scale with population.

I see the winner take all situation for electoral college votes as disenfranchising minority views.

Both for the urban areas in "red" states and the rural areas in "blue" states.

But they aren’t taxed without representation. In fact they are subsidized heavily. The very opposite.

Translation: all votes are equal, but rural votes are more equal than others.

Therefore it's "just" for a house, senate, and president representing a minority of Americans to raise taxes on urban Americans (70% of the economy), refuse to fund our infrastructure (HSR and the gateway project), and impose their religious beliefs on us.

These self serving arguments aren't convincing anyone. What urban America has actually heard over the last four years is that "when you have the voted, you do what you want," a lesson we have taken to heart.

It wasn't even that well-intentioned. It was a necessary concession to Southern slaveholders. It's always been anti-majoritarian.

There's also an hypothesis/theory that the Second Amendment was similar in origins:

* https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/09/the-ori...

* https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/24/opinion/second-amendment-...

Slavery wasn’t the only issue that mattered at the founding of the US, and this type of framing is the is revisionism found in things like the NYT’s 1619 project. The EC was well intentioned as a mechanism for federalism and forming a coalition of states that could retain their own self determination (and continue to do so today) while also being part of the union. It spans all issues and policies. And frankly it makes a lot of sense. Otherwise you will have lots of disenfranchised places and cultures and the union would fall apart.

No, of course it wasn't, but I also didn't say that. You're reading revisionism into a statement that is very nearly too short to contain any.

You're also misreading it: my comment was about the Senate, not the electoral college. And I left out the part about how the Senate was explicitly anti-democratic, not just anti-majoritarian, in that it was originally elected by legislators and not the people.

Weren’t the main concessions made to Southern slaveholders items like the 3/5 compromise? The senate’s distribution on the other hand would benefit states like Rhode Island, New Jersey, etc...

I don’t think this is a tyrant of the minority but rather an appropriate averaging of influenced - it is federalism working healthily. Different places, with different people and cultures, need autonomy and self determination if they are willing to join a union of states. Otherwise why would they take part in the union and give up their ways of life and laws and cultures? The mechanisms for making the union palatable to all are found in how we apportion senators and in the electoral college. I think this IS moderation.

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