In Response to the Tea Party
The Boston Tea Party was a rejection of the notion that someone can be taxed by the government when they are not represented in the government. One share of taxes earns one vote, so no share of the vote → none of the taxes. Let’s extend that concept: if one person got 68 votes, while everyone else got 1 vote apiece, then that over-represented person should (iniquity aside) pay 68 peoples’ worth of taxes. Now, Wyoming gets two Senators, and California gets two Senators — while California has 68 times the population. Therefore, Wyoming residents, to afford their excessive representation in government, would pay 68 times the taxes of Californians. Sure, Senators are only half of congress, so Wyomingans should really pay only 34 times as much as Californians. If Wyoming does not want to pay such high taxes, then justice demands that they accept a smaller share of government influence. No more free rides for people whose votes are given extra weight! No more suppression of the will of the taxpayers! The REAL Tea Party :)
The folks who suppose they should get unequal say in government, without paying extra taxes, are most like that other person who avoided taxes while controlling government: a king. They should call themselves the Monarchical Wing of the Republican Party.
(To forestall my critics: Wyoming has equal representation in the Senate out of supposed protection of small states — the New Jersey Plan to keep small sates from being abused by larger ones. Each state was its own government, part of a union, and fearful of being dominated by its neighbors. The power granted by their disproportionate representation in the legislature must protect those states from abuse by use of laws. If states’ protections could not be expressed in law, then states would have no need of extra Senators to protect them. Therefore, states’ protections can be expressed as law. So — let ‘states rights’ be enshrined in additions to the Bill of Rights for states, the tenth amendment, beyond the reach of a simple majority. That would serve to enact states’ protections as law, while eliminating the need for additional senate seats. If those states are unwilling to accept such a bill, then they can only be doing so to maintain their legislative advantage for the purpose of controlling the passage of laws which do not constitute states’ protections. That is usurpation.)
