This is a guest post by Kevin Davies, a writer (prose & songs [300+]), artist, graphic designer, game creator and publisher.
The USA has a population of 333,287,557 in 2022. If the USA is divided in half along the 98th meridian of longitude, we find that 80% of Americans (around 250 million) live in the EASTERN HALF of the USA — especially in the coastal and great lakes cities. Around 64.4% of the U.S. population lives east of the Mississippi River. [1]
The WESTERN HALF of the USA hosts 24% of its population (around 79 million people, 2022). If the west coast, including California and Washington state (around 53 million people) were removed from the western half, the rest of the west (the plains and desert east of the Rockies to the 98th meridian), around 33% of the American landmass, is inhabited by only around 9% of the USA’s population (around 27 million people).
For reference the New York City metropolitan area contained 23.6 million residents as of 2020.
This relatively lower population in the rural west is due in part to the arid climate caused by the lack of rainfall resulting from the position of the Rocky Mountains and the Cascade Range further west. [1]
So, under the principle of one-person-one vote and equality of representation in a democracy, this would suggest that the electors in the eastern half of the USA should have 80% of the total representation in the US government, with the west, minus California and Washington state, having just 9%. Yet that is not the case.
The USA’s Founding Fathers were not actually believers in democracy and set up the election and governance system to ensure that rural land owners maintained a greater share of power than their numbers would actually provide them in a real democracy.
This ploy has resulted in a very unjust imbalance of influence between urban and rural electors that today, as ever more people are moving from rural to urban areas with increasing population density, that it’s reached the point where the urban population is vastly under represented in government and national policies.
Elector inequality (i.e., not having the same number of people per electoral district), skews government representation and policy significantly toward rural interests over urban ones.
How many Americans realize this or comprehend its significance?
THE INEQUALITY OF THE ELECTORAL COLLEGE IN THE USA
“[E]ach state is guaranteed a minimum of three electors, regardless of population size. It also means that there is always a total of 538 electors, or equivalently, 538 electoral votes — that’s the sum of 435 voting members of the House, 100 senators, and three electors assigned to Washington, DC.”
“According to 2023 population estimates, one electoral vote in Wyoming accounts for around 194,000 people, while a vote in Texas, Florida or California accounts for over 700,000. For context, if all 538 electoral votes were distributed evenly among the US population, each vote would represent about 623,000 people.” [2]
“Wyoming makes up about 0.18% of the US population but controls 0.56% of all electoral votes. This difference may seem minuscule, but it translates to approximately two additional electoral votes for Wyoming, relative to its population share.”[2]
“California represents 11.6% of the US population and has 10% of all electoral votes. This means California controls roughly nine fewer votes in the Electoral College than it would if votes were allocated based on population alone (because 11.6% of the total 538 votes is about 63 electoral votes, but California currently controls 54).” [2]
THE INEQUALITY OF THE SENATE IN THE USA
“The distorted representation found in the Senate is, of course, due to the historic anachronism of having states be represented in the Senate instead of people. With Democrats more concentrated in larger states they are less represented. California gets just two senators despite having 68 times the population of Wyoming, which also gets two senators. Wyoming Republicans are much more represented in the US Senate than are California Democrats.” [3]
“The distortion of representation in the Senate goes beyond the partisan. A Black American is 16% less represented in the Senate than an American on average; A Latino American 33% less, an Asian American 29% less.” [3] More represented than the average are Rural (38%), Gun Owner (14%), White (13), as of 2023 to 2024. [3]
THE INEQUALITY OF CONGRESSIONAL SEATS IN THE USA
Based on the 2020 US Census Montana had a population of 542,704 per Congressional seat, Wyoming 577,719 per seat, California had 761,091 people per seat, New York 777,529 per seat, and Delaware 990,837 per seat; the US average was 761,169 per seat. [4] Again inequality equals an injustice.
People who live in states where it takes fewer people to gain a representative’s seat have more influence with their vote.
WHAT WILL IT TAKE FOR ELECTORS TO RECOGNIZE INJUSTICE?
Will the pro-wealthy, ill-conceived, and apparently often illegal actions of the Trump administration push this injustice to the breaking point resulting in a constitutional crisis?
How much longer with the electors of the USA accept that the people who are repeatedly deciding their fate represent a significant minority who are only able to achieve power due to an unjust electoral and governance system?
If the USA had elections and governance based on the actual desires of the electorate based on one-person-one vote with all government electoral districts having the SAME number of people, it is likely that conservatives would never obtain national power. Ever.
Plus, the wealthy would not be as represented as they have been and so would pay much more in taxes, making the USA a significantly more equitable country.
WHAT ABOUT CANADA?
Canada has a similar divide along the 98th meridian of longitude with its west coast having a higher population density west of the Rocky Mountains than within the plains or the north.
Like the USA Canada unfortunately allows each rural and especially western and northern electoral ridings (districts) to be populated by fewer electors than urban ridings — thus ensuring that each vote by a person in a rural area has more influence and thus greater representation to determine the government and its policies relative to each urban vote.
This ultimately gives the Conservatives a greater chance of being elected by their more rural supporters than they would have if the system were equitable.
However, Canada’s rural-urban elector inequity is not as bad as that of the USA because Canada does not have the undemocratic Electoral College, Senate, and Congressional seat assignments as grossly unrepresentative as in the USA. The Gerrymandering of US district boundaries only makes the lack of true representation worse.
In a modern age, from the view of people who support democracy and equity, there is no good reason for this injustice. Rural ridings can be made larger and/or urban ones smaller, so that every riding has the SAME NUMBER of ELECTORS +/– 100 people.
If Americans and Canadians want to ensure they reside in a real democracy, and that their representatives legitimately represent electors and the results of an election, it is essential that the practice of granting each rural vote more influence than an urban vote be ended.
— Kevin Davies, February 18, 2025.
[1] VIDEO - Why 80% of Americans Live East of This Line
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wwJABxjcvUc
[2] INFO - Representation in the Electoral College: How do states compare?
https://usafacts.org/.../electoral-college-states...
[3] INFO - The 2023–2024 U.S. Senate Is Exceedingly Unrepresentative in Multiple Ways
https://mettlinger.medium.com/the-2023-senate-will-be...
[4] INFO - Apportionment of Seats in the U.S. House of Representatives and Average Population Per Seat: 1910 to 2020
https://www2.census.gov/.../apportionment-data-table.pdf
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