How Did States Become So Liberal?

How Did States Become So Liberal?

By Leon Howard

Why does the state of Washington have 49 State Senators with only 39 counties? It has been a pet peeve of mine and I couldn’t believe the counties would give up their only voice in the State Legislature. Since LBJ’s “War on Poverty” began, it seems the coastal states have become liberal meccas and I recently found out what happened. “Reynolds vs. Sims” challenged Alabama’s Constitution on representation (1 senator/county) as a violation of the “equal protection” portion of the 14^th Amendment.

This happened in 1964. The liberal Supreme Court ruled that both state legislative houses must be based on population in a case titled, “Reynolds vs. Sims” from Alabama … A clear violation of the 10^th Amendment!  Prior to this “ruling”, most states allowed one senator per county, which was the only protection the smaller populated counties had to check the abuses of the more densely populated counties, like King and Pierce Counties; these 2 counties control the state legislature. In essence, 2 counties dictate to the other 37 counties what state revenues are spent on.

This is pure theft! Those 2 counties have stolen the voice of 37 counties and, like good communists, those 2 counties are not going to give up that control until we rip it from their hands!

Oregon and California have the same problem Washington does: One or two counties control the state agenda! There are 24 representatives and 11 senators “representing” the City of Los Angeles; that’s more than all the representatives and senators in the counties north of Sacramento!

The counties have lost their only representation in the state and that means the Supreme Court robbed all states of their republican form of government! A major ‘check & balance’ of power is missing thus virtually destroying the protection of individual liberty!

The federal government does not have the authority to dictate to the states how they set up their legislative bodies and prior to this “ruling”, states had theirs set up pretty much like the U.S. government: Representatives represented the people and the Senators represented the states; state legislatures were set up with the representatives representing the people and the senators representing the counties. With Earl Warren’s “reasoning”, there is no need for 2 legislative bodies. Washington State’s first Constitution, the constitution approved by the U.S. Congress in 1878, was set up differently, so to right this problem, we would have to pass an amendment to the Constitution and I would love to be a member of the committee that drafted that amendment. 

Here is the original language: Article VI, Section 2. "The number of the members of the House of Representatives shall never be less than eighteen nor more than sixty. The Senate shall consist of one-third the number of members as the House of Representatives." 

Obviously, they have exceeded the maximum number of representatives and senators; we have 98 representatives and 49 senators. The number of senators far exceeds the “ … one-third the number of members of the House of Representatives.” … Which wasn’t to exceed 20 and we have one-half the number of senators as representatives!

One problem is the states accepted the court’s opinion as a “ruling” which has been a major factor in the destruction and disregard of the 10^th Amendment! The Supreme Court is not authorized to make “rulings”; they are authorized to offer opinions … Congress can accept that opinion and let the matter drop or they can rewrite the law to comply with the opinion. The states have the same option and in this case they could have invoked the 10^th Amendment and told the court they were violating the 10^th Amendment and told the court “thanks but no thanks” … They didn’t so here we are.

What can we do? We’ll never get the 2 counties to agree to a state constitutional amendment that would take away their monopoly of power so what can we do?

The only recourse I can see would be a challenge to the Supreme Court ruling based on the 10^th Amendment. But I’m no expert; maybe this is a project for a legislative committee to work with a constitutional attorney to develop a strategy.

The original opinion was wrong because having 1 senator per county didn’t deny equal protection; it was part of the ‘checks & balances’ in a republic. It was just another nick in state sovereignty by a court appointed by FDR, one of liberty’s greatest enemies!