12B,C: Voting Power and Apportionment Group Activities 12C Apportionment 1. A college offers tutoring in Math, English, Chemistry, and Biology. The number of students enrolled in each subject is listed below. If the college can only afford to hire 15 tutors, determine how many tutors should be assigned to each subject. Examples adapted from David Lippman, http://www.opentextbookstore.com/mathinsociety/index.html a. Hamilton s Method Subject Students Standard Quota Math 330 English 265 Chemistry 130 Biology 70 b. Jefferson s Method Subject Students Standard Quota Math 330 English 265 Chemistry 130 Biology 70 Cara Lee Page 1
c. Webster s Method Subject Students Standard Quota Math 330 English 265 Chemistry 130 Biology 70 d. Hill-Huntington Method Subject Students Standard Quota Math 330 English 265 Chemistry 130 Biology 70 2. A small country consists of three states, whose populations are listed below. A: 6,000 B: 6,000 C: 2,000 a. If the legislature has 10 seats, use Hamilton s method to apportion the seats. b. If the legislature grows to 11 seats, use Hamilton s method to apportion the seats c. Does the new apportionment seem fair? Why or why not? State Population Standard Quota A 6,000 B 6,000 C 2,000 Cara Lee Page 2
The Three-Fifths Compromise and 1790 Census Data 3. In 1787, there was a Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia. The 55 delegates debated many issues and two of the most important were slavery and representation. Under the Great Compromise, the number of representatives per state would be determined by population size. But should enslaved African people, who had no rights in the United States, count as part of the population? Southern states said yes. Northern states said no. We will explore why. The 1790 Census Data The First US Census State 1 Population 2 Free Persons 3 Slave Population 4 3/5 Slave Population 5 Compromise Pop Vermont 85,539 85,539 0 0 85,539 New Hampshire 141,885 141,727 158 95 141,822 Maine 96,540 96,540 0 0 9,6540 Massachusetts 378,787 378,787 0 Rhode Island 68,825 67,877 948 569 68,446 Connecticut 237,946 235,182 2,764 1,658 236,840 New York 340,120 318,796 21,324 12,794 331,590 New Jersey 184,139 172,716 11,423 6,854 179,570 Pennsylvania 434,373 430,636 3,737 2,242 432,878 Delaware 59,094 50,207 8,887 5,332 55,539 Maryland 319,728 216,692 103,036 61,822 278,514 Virginia 747,610 454,983 292,627 175,576 630,559 Kentucky 73,677 61,247 12,430 7,458 68,705 North Carolina 393,751 293,179 100,572 South Carolina 249,073 141,979 107,094 64,256 206,235 Georgia 82,348 53,284 29,264 17,558 70,842 6 Number of Reps to House of Reps Counting the Population a. Look at the total population (Column 1) of Massachusetts and North Carolina in the 1790 Census Data. Use a divisor of 32,150 people (for Jefferson s Method) to determine the number of representatives that Massachusetts and North Carolina would have. Massachusetts: Representatives North Carolina: Representatives Cara Lee Page 3
Counting only Free Persons b. Look at the number of free persons (Column 2) for Massachusetts and North Carolina. Use a divisor of 32,150 people (for Jefferson s Method) to determine the number of representatives that Massachusetts and North Carolina would have. Massachusetts: Representatives North Carolina: Representatives c. Why might including enslaved people as part of a state s population even though they had no freedom or rights anger states that had few or no slaves? To break the deadlock between the states, the delegates agreed to count only 3/5 of enslaved African people towards representation. This agreement was known as the Three-Fifths Compromise The Results of the 3/5 Compromise d. Calculate the missing values in Columns 4 and 5 for Massachusetts and North Carolina. e. Use a divisor of 32,150 people (for Jefferson s Method) to determine the number of representatives that Massachusetts and North Carolina would have under the compromise. Then complete column 6 using the compromise column. There were a total of 105 representatives Massachusetts: Representatives North Carolina: Representatives Your Thoughts: f. Why do you think the South wanted to count enslaved people as part of their state s population? Why do you think the North did not? g. Why didn t the delegates end slavery and make the enslaved people full citizens? h. Was the 3/5 th compromise a fair resolution for slave states v. non-slave states? Why were the delegates so concerned about fairness when the enslavement of African people was not fair? Who else was not represented at the time? i. For further exploration you can look up the slave trade compromise that was also made at the 1787 Convention. Cara Lee Page 4
12B Apportionment and Voting Power Today 2010 Census Is each state equally represented in Congress and the Electoral College? 4. After every census, the representatives are re-apportioned. The table below shows the 2010 population data which will be used until the 2020 census has been completed. The table shows the number of representatives, electoral college votes for the state, and the voting power. The table goes onto the next page. a. To understand the table, calculate the missing values for representatives per million people and electoral power. Try your calculations for the first row to see if you are correct. Populations and Apportionment from 2010 Census using Hill-Huntington Method State Population (Millions) Number of House Seats from 2010 Apportionment Representatives per million people Electoral Votes (Number of Representatives + 2 Senators per State) Electoral Power (Electoral Votes per million people) Alabama 4.8 7 0.69 9 1.87 Alaska 0.7 1 3 Arizona 6.4 9 11 Arkansas 2.9 4 6 California 37.3 53 55 Colorado 5.0 7 0.72 9 1.78 Connecticut 3.6 5 0.72 7 1.95 Delaware 0.9 1 0.90 3 3.33 D.C. 0.6 3 0.20 3 5.00 Florida 18.9 27 0.70 29 1.53 Georgia 9.7 14 0.69 16 1.64 Hawaii 1.4 2 0.68 4 2.93 Idaho 1.6 2 0.79 4 2.54 Illinois 12.9 18 0.71 20 1.55 Indiana 6.5 9 0.72 11 1.69 Iowa 3.1 4 0.76 6 1.96 Kansas 2.9 4 0.72 6 2.10 Kentucky 4.4 6 0.73 8 1.84 Cara Lee Page 5
Louisiana 4.6 6 0.76 8 1.76 Maine 1.3 2 0.67 4 3.00 Maryland 5.8 8 0.72 10 1.73 Massachusetts 6.6 9 0.73 11 1.68 Michigan 9.9 14 0.71 16 1.61 Minnesota 5.3 8 0.66 10 1.88 Mississippi 3.0 4 0.74 6 2.01 Missouri 6.0 8 0.75 10 1.66 Montana 1.0 1 0.99 3 3.02 Nebraska 1.8 3 0.61 5 2.73 Nevada 2.7 4 0.68 6 2.21 New Hampshire 1.3 2 0.66 4 3.03 New Jersey 8.8 12 0.73 14 1.59 New Mexico 2.1 3 0.69 5 2.42 New York 19.4 27 0.72 29 1.49 North Carolina 9.6 13 0.74 15 1.57 North Dakota 0.7 1 0.68 3 4.44 Ohio 11.6 16 0.72 18 1.56 Oklahoma 3.8 5 0.75 7 1.86 Oregon 3.8 5 0.77 7 1.82 Pennsylvania 12.7 18 0.71 20 1.57 Rhode Island 1.1 2 0.53 4 3.79 South Carolina 4.6 7 0.66 9 1.94 South Dakota 0.8 1 0.82 3 3.66 Tennessee 6.4 9 0.71 11 1.73 Texas 25.3 36 0.70 38 1.50 Utah 2.8 4 0.69 6 2.17 Vermont 0.6 1 0.63 3 4.76 Virginia 8.0 11 0.73 13 1.62 Washington 6.8 10 0.68 12 1.78 West Virginia 1.9 3 0.62 5 2.69 Wisconsin 5.7 8 0.71 10 1.75 Wyoming 0.6 1 0.57 3 5.28 TOTAL 310 438 538 b. Does the apportionment of the representatives look fair to you from the table? Cara Lee Page 6
c. Below is a graph of the representatives per million people. Does the apportionment look fair to you from the graph? If there are any outliers, which states are they? (or District of Columbia) Representatives per million people Representatives per million people 1.20 1.00 0.80 0.60 0.40 0.20 0.00 0.0 5.0 10.0 15.0 20.0 25.0 30.0 35.0 40.0 State Population in Millions (and D.C.) d. Does the electoral voting power look fair to you from the table? Cara Lee Page 7
e. Which state has the greatest electoral voting power? Find the state on the scatterplot below. f. Which state has the least electoral voting power? Find the state on the scatterplot below. g. What pattern do you see when you look at the graph below? 6.00 Electoral Power per million people Electoral Votes per million people 5.00 4.00 3.00 2.00 1.00 0.00 0.0 5.0 10.0 15.0 20.0 25.0 30.0 35.0 40.0 State Population in Millions (and D.C.) h. Do you think our electoral voting system is fair? Cara Lee Page 8