Thread by @Lithros, settle in, make some popcorn, crack open a non-denominational cold one, and [...]

settle in, make some popcorn, crack open a non-denominational cold one, and get ready to hear the sordid story of the end of American federalism

that's right, folks, I'm talking about the 17th Amendment to the US Constitution

current and forthcoming Americans know that we vote directly for our representatives in Congress, both the House and the Senate. but it wasn't always this way!

Article I, Section 3 opens up by stating that Senators will be "chosen by the Legislature" of each state. you can contract this in Section 2, where members of the House are chosen "by the People". direct election wasn't on the table for Senators from the get-go

this wasn't an accident. Senators were also given six-year terms, as opposed to the House's two. the Senate was meant to be a more deliberate body, less responsive to the tides and whims best able to move the electorate

(before we go any further, let's make it clear that I don't care about the original intent of the framers at all. the Constitution is a messy document, vague where it isn't tainted by compromise with evil. this is not an argument for returning to the "founders' vision")

within a few decades of the Constitution's ratification, some people began pushing to resolve the problems created by letting state governments pick Senators. what were those problems?

first of all, it's anti-democratic! shouldn't the upper house of the governing body of the United States of America be made up of democratically elected officials? of course, the state legislators who choose them are democratically elected, but they are POLITICIANS

second, it leaves room for corruption. this became more of a problem over time, as crooked legislators found ways to wring more money out of Senatorial candidates in exchange for support. in some states, bribery was the only path to the Senate

even without corruption, it was obvious that Senators weren't responsive to the wishes of the people. the only ones they had to satisfy were the state legislators. Senators might be forced to direct federal funds to a state congressman's pet project, rather than serve the people

these are reasonable complaints. but it's worth noting the benefits. as interested politicians, state legislators really are likely to be better informed about the interplay between state and federal policy than even above-average voters

and if the states have a yoke on one of the Congressional oxen, they can better steer the direction of the federal government; influence can move in both directions, and the interests of smaller states will be better represented at the national level

I mean, have you seen the kind of jackasses the rabble put in the House? none of that in the Senate, thank you very much. just a genteel patrician's club, guiding the Congress with honor and skill

(I'm joking, but not entirely)

plus, is a little corruption between politicians of the same state really so bad? doesn't it just mean the Senator has some skin in the game?

(now I really am joking, but with a subtle hmm at the end, so you're not sure if I'm making some kind of nuanced point about incentives)

what we know is that the original model of choosing Senators wasn't a clear failure. but over time, the corruption incidents and populist arguments piled up. the push for popular Senate elections became too strong to resist, and the states ratified the 17th Amendment in 1913

things did not immediately fall apart. institutions change slowly. 1/3 of the Senate is elected every 2 years, so it took until 1919 for every Senator in office to have been elected in a popular vote

there were some political ramifications for the control of the government. the party composition of the Senate suddenly shifted, as gerrymandered or otherwise antidemocratic state government election results no longer decided who went to the Senate

and of course, inevitably, Senators started moving away from bending over backwards to make the state legislatures happy. while still working in line with their states' interests, there was no longer any need to satisfy state legislatures specifically

one of the benefits of legislatures choosing Senators was to reinforce federalism, to maintain separation and limit control of the federal government's power over the states. overnight, the passage of the 17th Amendment didn't destroy that. norms persisted

so far, none of this is all that controversial or bad. you might be wondering why I'm even writing this. what could I have against the 17th Amendment? isn't a little extra democracy worth... whatever problems I'm trying to describe?

the problem with the 17th Amendment is how it modifies incentives and fundamentally alters the relationship voters have with their governments, state and federal, and the media, in the long-term

jeez this is a lot

this is not stuff I would have expected anyone in 1912 to foresee. one of the great strengths of the American Experiment is its capacity for just that: experimentation. and the very next amendment, the 18th, shows that it's possible to undo one of these bad decisions

but the inadvertent harm of the 18th Amendment was immediate and obvious. the damage done to the fabric of our country by the 17th takes generations to mature. but it's here now. we're living in it

from a pre-17th voter's perspective, interest in federal politics almost requires interest in state politics. only knowing the political situation of your state's legislature can help you make sense of who your Senators are and why they do what he do

this encourages healthy engagement in state government, and the cultivation of opinions about more local issues. the need for discussion and information on these questions creates a demand for local journalism to focus on them. this is the lifeblood of federalism

post-17th, all bets are off. you can consider yourself politically active while devoting none of your attention to state or local issues. you might spend all your time arguing about politics and not even know who your local representatives are

this shift takes time, though. the habits and customs of political engagement need to be relearned by each successive generation. these are informed not just by political activity itself, but also the way political issues are covered in the news

at first, Senators needed to appeal to the popular issues of the day, and so would speak to the national issues that mattered in the moment. the news would, correctly, cover those issues. and any given issue covered had relevance, at least, for every person in an entire state

contrast that with covering the individual plots and histories of dozens or hundreds of state legislatures, and how much more granular and disparate that kind of coverage would need to be. the news was able to coalesce, and this coincide with mass media neatly

there was now a Narrative, and Senators could affect it, but Senatorial candidates needed to ride it. the News would propagate it, the People would pick a side on it, and modern American politics was born

there were, of course, Narratives before this, but they always pulled back to the states at some point. no longer. after the 17th Amendment, Senators served at the pleasure of the people, and every question became a national question. the states found less and less relevance

but this was not the end. a Senator could fall from grace, wind up on the wrong side of an issue. polarization was not so strong yet, and the pollsters not so deft at predicting the value of positions

today, the idea that any individual Senator is responsive to the will of the people of their state is little more than a hypothetical. every six years the incumbent shows up and wins, barring bad timing with a presidential election. all politics is national politics

without the 17th Amendment, we may have retained some of that local interest, and better incentivized the media to keep the people invested and aware of what their state legislatures are up to. with the legislatures neutered at the federal level, there's no reason to bother

federalism is a phantasm, a pale shade that lingers as a decoration, not an active force in American politics. there's no longer any reason to pretend otherwise

now, in recent years there have been some calls to repeal the 17th Amendment, mainly by Republican politicians. they have various rationale, some of which I've mentioned here

while I agree that the 17th Amendment has been destructive of American politics, I think we're past the point where abandoning it would make any difference. even if we repealed the requirement tomorrow, it's likely every state would continue to choose Senators via popular vote

that is their right, after all; the Constitution gives no requirement for how the legislatures should select Senators. and the people view it as their right to do so, at this point, as well

so, rather than argue for repealing the 17th now, I view this as an opportunity to point out that federalism is more fragile than we thought. that there's a natural tendency, in human societies, for power to centralize, in a way that's harmful to the health of democracies

how can increasing democracy lead to a result that's unhealthy to democracy? it's a question worth asking, but I think it answers itself. if you give the shop wholly to the people, the people will eventually give away the shop, every time

so far we've been lucky, and the vicious cycle of broader politics promoting broader news promoting broader politics hasn't destroyed us. but it's made governing the country harder, and the experimental spirit is replaced by an apocalyptic one

federalism means we can try different things in different places, and work hard to understand why they work or not. but when we push for everything to be the same, that benefit is lost. the state legislatures were the core of that spirit, and we broke it

thanks for reading! I have many other thoughts on politics and the US government, but this will have to do for now. fight the incentives -- try to figure out what's wrong with your local or state government today!

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