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This is where you tie it in with the idea of creating a virtual Congress, putting it on the Internet via secure server. Each congressional district would be drawn to contain 30,000 people, and congressmen would work out of their homes or small local offices. Committee meetings would be held via Skype or some kind of videoconferencing software, and votes would be tallied via secure server. This would put all of Congress on the Internet.

The first advantage would be local control. A congressman would have daily access to his 30,000 constituents and would hear them clearly without the current massive filtering via his staff.

The second advantage would be the disappearance of K Street. The locus of corruption would move from the District of Columbia to the 10,000 or so congressional districts. That many congressmen is far too many to bribe or pay off efficiently. It would reduce the influence of big money on the electoral process.

The third advantage would be national security. A nuclear device detonated over Washington would have no effect on the House, which would continue to do business on one or more secure servers while the remainder of the government recovered from the attempted decapitation.

This would be a good way of entering the 21st Century in terms of technology.

And the Speaker would emerge as President.

Interesting idea about a virtual House. The 30,000 per Representative was a minimum. At that number, you would have over 10,000 Representatives. Even if the ratio were 100,000:1, that would be just under 3,100 Representatives.

You would still have a physical Senate? I suggested a few essays ago that the Senate should be thought of as more of a gathering of state ambassadors to a United States (without the Security Council of controlling states). Let them gather and agree on mutually beneficial interests.

It would be an interesting new dynamic to have a virtual House and a physical Senate.

-PJ

You have the kernel. I hope you develop it in a stand alone vanity.

After repeal of the 17A, a virtual senate that features senators with offices adjacent to state legislative chambers is worth considering.

Still, legislatures are personal in nature, so I’m not sold on a entirely virtual congress, but certainly look forward to your ideas.