Should We Increase The Size of the House?

In 1929, Congress passed the Reapportionment Act, which set the size of the House at 435 seats. This act was passed because the Republican-controlled Congress did not want to reapportion, because many incumbents would have been redistricted out of their seats. For the next eighty years, the U.S. population grew, and the size of the House stayed the same. At the time, each member of Congress represented around two-hundred thousand people. Now, each member of Congress represents six-hundred fifty thousand people, and that number will only grow after next year’s census.

Today, Congress receives dismal approval ratings, and over ninety percent of incumbents get reelected. Political careerism is rampant, and the consensus is that something needs to be done. Many propose term limits as a solution to the underrepresentative Congress, but I say that will only cure the symptoms, not the disease. The real way to give Congress back to the people, is to increase the size of the House.

When the Bill of Rights was passed by the First Congress and sent out to be ratified by the states, there were twelve proposed amendments, not ten. One of these was not added to the Constitution for another two hundred years – we know it today as the Twenty-seventh Amendment. The other was lost in the annals of history. It was known as the Congressional Apportionment Amendment, or Article the First. It’s intent was to set a minimum apportionment – one representative for every fifty thousand people.

If the Congressional Apportionment Amendment were ratified today, the House would have to consist of 5,628 members. That is an insane number – it would require a Capitol the size of a stadium. Or would it? With modern technology, it can be possible to have several meeting-places for the House, and a central location where all the votes are aggregated electronically. Not only would it make things easier, but having say, four buildings in different locations where 1,407 representatives meet would ensure for continuity of government in a worst-case scenario such as a terrorist attack or invasion by a foreign army.

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