9 Steps to Maximize Participation in Our Participatory Representative Democracy
We must amend the Constitution and pass new laws to maximize the democratic aspects of our participatory representative democracy and get more Americans into the voting booth.
We Have a Not Voting Problem in America
Ninety-five million voting-age Americans did not vote in November, 2024. Did not participate in the election won the popular vote for President and crazier still, the Electoral College.
People do not vote for a multitude of reasons. First amongst these reasons is that many states make it hard to vote. Better your opposition never show up to be defeated than to have popular ideas of your own that win.
Second, people feel disillusioned and apathetic that when it comes to voting their vote simply does not count. The Electoral College distorts the idea of one person one vote for the highest office in the land, and that trickles down to the sentiment for voting in general. We saw this in real-time in November as states where the Electoral College vote was never in doubt had huge decreases in participation, again from already low numbers compared to the world’s other democracies.
The Keys to Increasing Voter Participation
Unlike all other liberal democracies, the United States Constitution does not include an affirmative right for citizens to vote. This is a right we must guarantee. Unlike other liberal democracies with a President, the United States does not directly elect our highest executive representative. We must directly elect the President by popular vote.
Here is a nine-point plan of governance changes that will maximize the democratic elements of our self-government while also boosting participation and engagement:
Amend the Constitution to add an affirmative right to vote for every citizen 18 years and older. Implement this right by creating a national voter ID database that allows every citizen to vote in every federal, state and local election in their district of residency.
Amend the Constitution to outlaw gerrymandering. Draw House districts as close to squares as possible starting in the northeast corner of each state, and making the square box the size required to fit in the right amount of apportioned residents. Then draw the next box in the same fashion until all the residents of the state are apportioned equally in neat little boxes.
Apply these same district drawing rules to every office at the state and local levels.Pass laws to move in-person voting to a full weekend covering Saturday and Sunday Election Weekend. Also, add a consistent early voting period of 4 weeks in every election at the local, state and federal level. Finally, make mail-in voting the law of the land for every election, along with in-person voting for the voting period.
Pass a law to expand the size of the House from 435 seats, or 773,000 residents per representative, to 1,305 seats, or 257,000 residents per representative. Then reapportion Congress based on the above district drawing rules. You want even better representation, then expand the size of the House to 2,611 seats for 128,000 residents per representative.
Amend the Constitution to replace the Electoral College for electing the President and Vice President with a national popular vote.
Pass laws to implement ranked choice voting in primary elections and general elections for every office at the local, state and federal levels.
Senate reform
In the Senate, abolish the 60-vote filibuster for all legislation. If this happens, the sclerotic Senate can return to the talking filibuster for each Senator.
For an even more democratic and representative government, amend the Constitution so that the Senate only has veto power over legislation from the House. Require 3/4 of the Senate to veto legislation passed by the House to stop the bill from reaching the President. The Senate would retain its power, along with the House, to override a Presidential veto.
Make Washington, D.C., a state via act of Congress, and amend the Constitution to allow the federal seat of government to be a state.
Make Puerto Rico a state, if after an official ballot, the people of Puerto Rico choose statehood.
Neither party advocates for these policies. Offering more proof that we need independent Americans to run for every single office in America to pass these pro-American priorities.
Maximizing our democracy and increasing participation in our self-governance is vital to the continued success of our American experiment. While I certainly have my politics, my goals here are not for my favored policies to become reality, but rather that the policies a majority of Americans support have an easier time becoming law.
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