The Silent Votes

by Wayne Bruce Allbin

The door into this millennium opens upon a universe of possibilities. We’ve experienced thousands of years of forms of government all of which were deformed by the power which they concentrated. Some great concepts have been strangled by tyrants; others have been/are being corrupted by greed and the abuse of trust.

As of July 12, 2008, the ratio of persons represented in the House of Representatives to the Representatives increases by one person every ten seconds–3,153,600 persons per year. The longer one is alive, the less one is represented.

From the original ratio (1:30,000) when the Constitution was formed, we have fallen to one Representative per 700,192 persons (as of 11:25 pm GMT on 7/12/08), i.e. representation has become 435:304,583,546. Based on the founders’ original intent, each person today is under represented. As of 11:25 pm GMT on 7/12/08, arguably 670,192 persons per Representative are either not represented or are under represented. As of 7/12/08, 435 X 670,192 (persons in excess of 30,000) = 291,533,520 persons in the US either under represented or not represented. This works out to 291,533,520/304,583,628 = 95.75% of the persons in the United States being under represented or not represented according to original intent.

These unheard persons are “heard” screaming in Detroit, in Watts, in New Orleans, San Francisco and everywhere there is injustice. Except in the House of Representatives where they are not heard.

The basic vote of the military-industrial complex, i.e., money, inundates the vote of the ordinary person. The ordinary person’s voice is stifled by 95.75%. Tax legislation is controlled by industry lobbyists. The people’s lobbyists are only the Representatives, yet 95.75% of the people are under represented or not represented. The vox populi is stifled and unheard.

The persons whose voices are effective on Congress are ever fewer minute by minute If the donation of money is a constitutional equivalent of “free speech”, the enormous imbalance in influence and representation which ensues blocks the United States from being a republic with democratic principles. The basic factor of democracy in the United States Congress was designed to be in the House. The very concept, money being a condition precedent to the voting privilege, was discarded by the founders in the Constitutional Convention.

Yet the corporation has such an extraordinary leverage through the power of money, it is able to manipulate Representatives. A grave factor is the diminution of our vote: Article I, Section 2 of the US Constitution provides that representation in the House of Representatives shall not fall below one Representative for every thirty thousand citizens.

In 1929, the House limited the total number of Representatives to 435. The 2000 census counted 281,424,177 people in the US. Rather than the Constitutional ratio, 1:30,000, the 2000 census ratio (435:281,424,177) equates to 1:646,952. No wonder the American government is like a runaway train No one is steering.

The very interests from whom government was created to protect us are in charge. The real question is “what can we do now”?