this post was submitted on 08 Aug 2023
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But a federalist system isn't meant to be democratic. It is supposed to guarantee rights and some influence to everyone including minorities.
Requiring a majority of counties to agree on things isn't good for minorities in general.
It generally grants outsized power to one specific minority in particular - white rural voters.
Yes rural voters. That is again the point. Federalism is supposed to balance power between the entities of the federation- which aren't necessarily the populace.
No.
Federalism is about division of power at different scales of government.
In a confederation, the general level of government is subordinate to the regional level. In a unitary government, regional government is subordinate to the general level.
Israel, the UK, and China are examples of unitary states. The EU is a confederation, and the US was one for about a decade before the constitution was passed.
In a federal system, different levels of government are of equal power, but have different powers. States can't control interstate commerce; the federal government can't regulate state speed limits except by doing something like withholding federal highway trust fund money.
While the US federal government started out as an alliance between existing colonies, states didn't start out as an alliance of counties. US States are mostly (all?) unitary governments; Ohio counties have the powers the state government delegates to them.
Counties historically have been a matter of pragmatic. Counties are small so everyone could easily travel to their local county government on foot or horseback. They weren't intended as a way to gerrymander state populations to entrench rural power.
There's a reason that neither the Ohio senate nor the Ohio house follow 'one county, one representative'. Because that would be absolutely bonkers.
What are you talking about? "Minorities" in this context refers to the people with the lower number of votes cast. They lose. It's the very definition of voting.
Yes.
Not necessarily? Plenty of candidates lose the popular vote then win elections in all sorts of campaigns.