The founding fathers sought to balance power among the state so that no large state could impose its will on the others. As a result, the Constitution gives excess power to rural states, which given how demographics trends have evolved over the years, tend to be white, Republican, and conservative. We are not starting with a level playing field but rather one that has a heavy tilt to the right.
How we select the Senate hugely empowers low population rural states at the expensive of high population urban states. The population differences are enormous, yet all states get the 2 Senators. The two major minority groups in the country, Hispanics and African Americans, tend to live in high population states, resulting in their significant under-representation in the Senate. In selecting the Senate, the typical Hispanic’s and African American’s vote is “worth” only 58% and 75% , respectively, of a white person’s vote.
The reason I am writing about this issue is not that I believe we can change how we elect Congress in the foreseeable future (it is hard wired into the Constitution) but rather to understand how things are stacked. As the graphic below shows, overtime the variation in the populations of states is only widening. Given the demographic trends and the fact that we are starting from a system that over represents rural areas and under represents minorities, urban dwellers, and basically the Democrats, it makes it imperative that we fight against the egregious attempts to take further power through gerrymandering and voter suppression.
The data behind the findings:
I created a Senate voting power index for African Americans, Hispanics, and whites. First, I calculated each state’s Senate voting power index by dividing their population by the population of the median state (Kentucky). This measures the percentage above or below each state’s population is relative to the median state’s population. Half the states are more populated than the median state and have a ratio great than one and half have populations below the median and their ratios are below one. Second, I calculated the percentage people in each racial/ethnic group that lived in each state. Last, I then multiplied the percentage who lived in each state by the states voting power index to create a weight average index for each group based on where they live. I actually did these calculations for both the House and the Senate at the Congressional district and State level but found that the variation in voting power for the House is so small compared to the Senate that it really has no effect. The attached table shows the data and classifications for the Senate.
The weighted indexes are at 77.24, 59.29, and 44.91 for whites, blacks, and Hispanics. First, it should be noted that all three groups have an average voting power index that is below 1, which means even the typical white person is underrepresented in the Senate. That is, the typical white person tends to live in one of the 25 relatively more populated states but still only gets 2 Senators. Hispanics’ votes are “worth” 58% of white votes (44.91/77.24). Compared to those in the median state, their vote has only 44.9% the power. For blacks, their votes are “worth” 77% of white votes (59.29/77.24) on average. Compared to the median state voters, blacks votes are typically have only 59% of the power.