The Erosion of the State(s)

The Death of Federalism and It’s Consequences

Silent Kone
9 min readJan 19, 2022

I. A BRIEF HISTORICAL PRIMER

The First Progressive Era, it could be easily argued, is the point at the peak of the slippery slope the United States now finds itself at the bottom of. From the exit of the highly underrated Grover Cleveland in 1897 to the election and ascension of Warren G. Harding in 1921, the U.S. saw the creation of the Federal Reserve and the permanent implementation of the income tax (a policy which had already been attempted and discarded some forty years prior). It also saw the introduction of intellectually bankrupt thought to the masses, whether it be Eugene Debs and the height of Socialism in America electorally, or Theodore Roosevelt and his watered-down version of those same ideas. Along with all of this, numerous other pieces of inane legislation, most notably: The Seventeenth Amendment.

Long had there been grumblings of unhappiness with the role of the State Legislature in the election of Senators. Around the turn of the century, the practice had come under increasing scrutiny, especially from the public. Issues of corruption and bribery regarding votes and appointments, as well as long-deadlocks leading to vacant seats and ballooning costs to taxpayers in certain states led to a steady increase in a desire for change among the people.1 By the end of the Taft Administration, public support for reform was massive, and many states had already changed their election laws to allow for the election of Senators by some kind of Popular Vote.2 The next year, under the Wilson Administration, the Seventeenth Amendment was ratified, and the Popular Vote was now law across America.

This Amendment would prove to be the first, and most damaging, blow struck to the Founders’ uniquely-constructed Electoral System.

II. THE ELECTORAL SYSTEM AND HOW IT FUNCTIONS

To understand the imbalance that the Seventeenth Amendment creates, one must first understand the American Electoral System.

The House of Representatives operates at the micro level; one of the few remnants of Periclean Democracy found in the Founders’ Constitutional Republic. It’s the most numerous body and the one that represents the will of the people, hence, these representatives are elected by the people. The Senate, on the other hand, doesn’t represent the people or small communities nor the country at large, it represents the STATE and her interests. Hence, the State appoints its representative via its own legislature.

Add in the election of the President via the Electoral College, and everyone is represented in a way that is impossible in a Democratic system, direct or otherwise, because a Democratic system necessarily only represents the majority. This is the tyranny of the fifty-one percent. As Madison said in Federalist №10:

“Hence it is such that democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security or the rights of property; and have in general been as short in their lives as they have been violent in their deaths.”

III. THE (NO LONGER) BICAMERAL LEGISLATURE

With the election of Senators via Popular Vote, the Senate’s entire purpose must be called into question. The Upper Chamber has become, functionally, the same as the Lower Chamber. As James Madison illustrates in Federalist №62, the purpose of the Senate, among other things, is to:

“giv[e] to the State governments such an agency in the formation of the federal government as must secure the authority of the former, and may form a convenient link between the two systems.”

The Senate was to function as a bridge between the levels of government; a key support of the Federalist system that the Founders designed. It’s easy to see, as Federalism has been incrementally bludgeoned by the ever-growing Federal Bureaucracy in the past hundred years since the passage of the Seventeenth. (Importantly, the Seventeenth Amendment is not the lone cause of this decline, and that is not the claim being made).

Madison details another key function of the Senate in the aforementioned Federalist №62, saying: “Another advantage accruing from this ingredient in the constitution of the Senate is, the additional impediment it must prove against improper acts of legislation.” It’s a crucial check on the oft-mentioned tyranny of the majority; for a piece of legislation to pass, it must have support from the majority of the people (the House), the states (the Senate), and the Chief Executive. The Seventeenth Amendment demolishes this entirely.

The end result: the Senate is a smaller, more powerful House of Representatives. They are, in practice, the same body; a redundancy. The only difference: the Senate is much more dangerous.

IV. THE NATIONALIZATION OF THE SENATE

Because of the size of the Senate, relative to the House, each member has an outsized impact on policy. With a limited number of Senate elections per cycle (again, relatively) there is an outsized national attention on these races. Because, one man in Arizona is the difference in, say, passing a skinny repeal of the Affordable Care Act; one woman, also (incidentally) from Arizona, the difference in passing Filibuster “reform”. When you add the Popular Vote into the mix, all of a sudden, these State races, become National ones. These Senate races are no longer about a Senator’s contribution to their state, instead, they have to answer for the National Party Platform; it’s no longer about a Senator’s accomplishments for their state, but about the National Party’s accomplishments at the Federal level. Why should, for example, Joe Manchin (D-WV) have to answer for President Biden shutting down national pipelines via executive fiat? It doesn’t make sense that he should, but he will in 2024.

It’s even more evident looking at the current landscape. The aforementioned Joe Manchin and Kirsten Sinema (D-AZ) are both fairly popular among their constituencies3, and yet, both will receive serious, heavily financially-backed primary challengers in 2024. Not because of an overall disapproval in their own states, but because the loud Progressives in the party and the big donors located nowhere near West Virginia or Arizona are unhappy with them. It’s no different on the other side of the aisle, where someone like Tim Scott (R-SC), who, whatever you make think of him, is relatively popular in South Carolina, and has been one of the most consistent votes against the Biden agenda. Even then, he is facing primary challengers who are largely being funded and pushed by individuals well outside the state of South Carolina.

In short, putting this position in the hands of the voters, means… it’s in the hands of the voters. Voters who are swayed by media spin (in both directions), by the power of incumbency or name recognition and by the blitz of campaign ads paid for by massive amounts of cash flowing in from elsewhere in the country (but more on this in a minute).

V. THE DEMOCRATIZATION OF CORRUPTION

By putting Senate in the hands of the people, we’ve also seen the rise of the “Career Politician”. While back in the early-1900s, during the genesis of the Seventeenth Amendment, there was concern of major corruption amongst the citizenry (and perhaps rightfully so; is there any government completely clean of backroom, handshake deals?). However, the institution of Popular Vote in Senatorial elections has only increased the corrupt, career politicians who’ve spent decades in the District of Columbia fattening their own wallets. This is clearly evident to anyone with even cursory knowledge of the last fifty or so years of American politics, but it’s backed up by the numbers.

In Maine, you had twenty-seven Senators that served in the 93 years between 1820 and 1913, meaning a Senator held office for ~6.89 years on average. From 1913 to 2024 Maine has had only fifteen people hold the office, each serving ~15.07 years on average.

Virginia, from 1789 to 1913, had forty-four Senators, an average of just ~5.37 years. In the 111 years since, they’ve had just fifteen hold the office, an average service time of ~14.83 years.

In California, twenty-five Senators served in the period from 1850 to 1913, an average service time of ~5.14 years. There have been only twenty Senators since 1913, the average service time doubling to ~10.63.

These are just three examples using some rudimentary calculations, and yet, the numbers are clear. It was this point, the ratification of the Seventeenth Amendment, when Governance in the United States fully transformed from Public Service to Career.

VI. THE RESULTS

So, not only does this popular system of election forgo state sovereignty and the entire concept of Federalism, it also facilitates corruption by putting it in the hands of the average voter to deal with it. Voters who are primarily interested in voting for the people who seem nice and who’s name they recognize. Meanwhile, the entire position has been altered so that, to become a Senator, you have to run for President (i.e., federally). The dump trucks of donor money and media manipulation can mask any corruption while name recognition does the rest.

Some might object, on the grounds that people outside of the state in question can’t actually cast a ballot. But, even if they can’t, they can certainly sway the people that do. Which is where the money comes in.

VII. THE PLAGUE OF BIG CITY MONEY

The nationalization of these states races has massive potential effects on their outcome, some of which have already been touched on, but the most important one is monetarily. Because the Senate is no longer about serving a particular state, and instead is a de facto federal position, everyone in the country has a vested interest in the outcome of Senatorial races. Herein lies the problem.

I’ve seen the evidence first hand in the emails of old peers that make up the Professional and Upper classes in places like Los Angeles and San Francisco. Multiple donor list emails a day trying to unseat a politician who represents people fifteen hundred miles away from them. In 2018, it was Robert O’Rourke trying to unseat Ted Cruz (R-TX). In 2020, it was people like Sara Gideon and Amy McGrath trying to unseat Susan Collins (R-ME) and Mitch McConnell (R-KY). In 2022, it will be people like Rand Paul (R-KY) and Ron Johnson (R-WI).

Sure, there was no amount of money in the world that would’ve flipped Mitch McConnell’s seat in 2020, but, just because it didn’t work, doesn’t mean it isn’t dangerous. What say should a man in Los Angeles have over who represents the state of Kentucky? The answer is none and the very real dangers of the system, as currently constituted, were made very clear in the case of the 2018 Senate race in Texas.

In 2018, Ted Cruz vastly under-performed Donald Trump in both 2016 and 2020, as well as fellow Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) in 2020, only narrowly holding on to the seat. Certainly, this could be chalked up, at least partially, to the political environment, which was very good for Democrats. However, political environment doesn’t tell the whole story, as evidenced by Greg Abbott’s huge win on the same night. The much clearer culprit is in the money. In 2020, John Cornyn outspent his opponent by around five million dollars, whereas in 2018, Ted Cruz was outspent by almost thirty-five million dollars. O’Rourke raised and spent almost 80 million total, much, if not most, coming from individuals in Los Angeles and New York funneling money through ActBlue.

What the Cruz-O’Rourke race shows, is the depth of the damage that has been done to the system via this nationalization of our elections. So much, in fact, it’s even seeped into other, non-federal races like Ron DeSantis’ upcoming re-election bid in Florida or the massive numbers donated to Kim Klacik (a topic for another time). What was started in 1913 is complete, the tearing down of our wholly unique Republican system, the American Experiment, for an (un)representative democracy, dominated by the money and influence of the Big City Elite, and the political inattentiveness of the average American voter.

VIII. THE AMERICAN EXPERIMENT

This is the sad, and potentially irreversible, reality of American Politics in the 21st century. A wound that has festered for decades that is finally preparing to finish the country off, one contested election at a time. In the face of this reality, it’s important to make it clear that the American Experiment was not a failure, but that it was abandoned by disingenuous egotist bureaucrats and a naïve populace for failed ideas in the name of “democracy” as if democracy is a virtue unto itself.

However, America has been on the brink before. As movements like the Reagan Revolution, the early Tea Party and, at least some sects, of the current America First movement have shown, the destruction of the carefully constructed principles of American Governance is not a certainty. It’s a long road to repair the damage done to our institutions and start repealing the Seventeenth Amendment would be a good start.

--

--