<x-flowed>Off list, I was informed that some consider the addition of an
at-large seat in Utah to be one of inter-state inequality rather then
intra-state inequality.  I respectfully disagree, and I hope you will
consider the following explanation.

If this goes through, Utah will have four district seats and one
at-large seat.  For comparison purposes, consider Connecticut, which
has five district seats and the hypothetical state of ZZ, which has
five at-large seats.

Presume for the moment that this system is unfair because ZZ voters
get to vote for five members of Congress and UT voters get to vote for
two members of Congress while CT voters only get to vote for one.  But
how can this be unfair when each state is of the same size and has the
same number of representatives?  From a superficial perspective, 1P1V
appears to be satisfied.

The answer is that there is not really any inter-state inequality.
The only inequality is intra state.

While the voters who are part of the majority in state ZZ get to elect
five representatives, the voters in the minority in ZZ don't get to
elect any representatives because their candidates are virtually
certain to lose.  Thus, on average, voters of ZZ and CT have the same
influence in Congress.  There is on average no inter-state inequality.

In contrast, the influence of a particular voter in ZZ depends on
whether that voter is part of the majority or part of the minority.
The minority group in ZZ is more or less disenfranchised, and there is
clear intra-state inquality.

Any intra-state inequality in UT will be much less than in ZZ, but it
will still be there.

According to current Supreme Court precedent, the inequality produced
by at-large districts is unconstitutional only if there is
discriminatory intent (section 2 is another story).  In my paper,
which was mentioned in a recent post, I take the rather strong
position that at-large districts always cause inequality and should
therefore be unconstitutional in representative bodies.

best,
Jeff O'Neill
http://ssrn.com/author=367415


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