Is Congress Too Small? It’s Not Just A Leftist Talking Point Anymore

Increasing the size of Congress may be on the table for some scholars on the left and right alike.

The U.S. population rose from over 123 million in 1930 to over 331 million in 2020, according to the U.S. Census. Yale University historian Mark Peterson argued that the U.S. House of Representatives’ 435-seat limit set in 1929 makes the legislature less representative than America’s Founding Fathers intended, YaleNews reported July 7.

“We have created this false sense that representation is a scarce item that we have to fight tooth and nail over, when we could have as many representatives as we want,” Peterson said regarding the unchanged representation.

Peterson did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.

“I think that the United States needs a major constitutional reworking … But I don’t think it will happen according to the rules of the 1787 Constitution,” Peterson told YaleNews. “I very much encourage Americans of every age and every stripe to start thinking about the kind of country they would want, how it would look, how it would be structured, and start imagining ways to get there.”

Additionally, expanding the House and abolishing the Senate is part of the Democratic Socialists of America’s agenda.

However, the idea of expanding the House is not necessarily a left-wing initiative.

“The Constitution establishes 30,000 as the minimum size of a congressional district, but it sets no maximum,” Hillsdale College professor Kevin Portteus told the DCNF. “James Madison noted in The Federalist that establishing the correct size for a legislature involves balancing two imperatives. On the one hand, districts can’t be so large that elected representatives cannot represent their constituents effectively. On the other hand, if districts are too small, the legislature will be so large that it is completely unmanageable.”

The average population of a congressional district today is 761,169 seats, according to the 2020 Census. It was 280,675 in 1930. Delaware’s sole congressional district represents 990,837 people.

Portteus said increasing the size of the House “would certainly be feasible,” noting that the British House of Commons currently has 650 members and that the German Bundestag has 630 members.

“Both nations, moreover, have significantly smaller populations than the United States. American congressional districts are massive by comparison, so adding members would certainly enable representatives to more accurately reflect their constituents,” Portteus said. “On the other hand, the larger a legislature becomes, the more likely it is to be dominated by its leadership, and the more it needs such domination to be capable of legislating effectively. So, it’s a trade-off.”

Another member of Hillsdale’s political science faculty warned of a similar trade-off.

“The Founders argued that creating a numerous legislature would be disastrous because it would ‘incapable of transacting public business,’ as the Anti-Federalist Brutus put it. A large assembly can’t deliberate or debate, and there are too many disagreements to work out,” Hillsdale College professor Joseph Postell told the DCNF.

Postell is a former visiting fellow at The Heritage Foundation.

“James Madison warned in the Federalist papers, increasing the size of the legislature would make it ‘more oligarchic’ rather than more democratic, because in order to get anything done, rank-and-file members would give up much of their independence and be directed by leaders,” Postell said. “We see this today, even with only 435 members in the House: it’s the committees and the party leaders that run the House, rather than ordinary individual members. I think the Founders would worry that increasing the size of the House would exacerbate these problems rather than fix them.”

Postell said that while the United States has “already gone a long way towards creating a numerous legislature,” he thinks “there could be some good effects of increasing the size of the House a small amount.”

“Most importantly, it would create smaller districts in which average citizens may actually be acquainted with their candidates and representatives,” Postell said. “In turn, it might make those representatives listen more to their constituents than to national organizations and donors. Even in rural states and districts, these effects might actually increase their voice rather than diminish it.”

Postell said that for those reasons, he’s “somewhat receptive” to increasing the size of the House to 585 districts.