It’s Time to Abolish the Racist Senate

May 18, 2019

The Senate is an undemocratic artifact. It gives small states large powers.

It is also racist. It gives sparsely-populated mostly-white states more power than heavily-populated racially-diverse states. A voter in Wyoming has 70 times more influence than a voter in California. And taxpaying U.S. citizens in racially-diverse Washington D.C. and Puerto Rico have no Senate vote at all.

Why a Senate?

The founders had to convince the colonies to unite—and giving states more powers helped with this. Some founders did not completely trust liberty. Members of the House of Congress--the "people's house"--were seen as being prone to shortsighted extremism.

The Senate was supposed to be a dignified body that floated above politics and could veto whatever bills the House created. Originally, senators weren’t voted upon directly, but were chosen by state legislatures.

Creating both the House and the Senate was called The Great Compromise. This compromise is also what set up the Three-Fifths compromise, which counted slaves as three-fifths of a person.



Be Gone

The United States is a different nation now than it was in the 1700s. This system is unfair and tips the power to specific kinds of voices. Be gone. We need to abolish this undemocratic and racist artifact of our past. We agree it is time for a change.