Perfect Congress

After another of the many Bernie Sanders interviews I have witnessed, I got to thinking of how wonderful it would be if more independent-minded legislators were in our national congress.  [ Understand here, I am using the word Congress to include both houses, not the singular House of Representatives that has come to be the popular usage nowadays.]  Sanders is now a Senator from Vermont, elected to that seat in 2006 after sixteen years in the House.  He is an Independent, and he is a thinking person who looks at all possible sides of arguments before giving his opinions.  Though he caucuses with (has more in common with at present) the Democrats, he has no trouble speaking up against those same colleagues if he views them to be leaning in some unreasonable direction.  He has even suggested that it might be a good idea to have someone more progressive who could run in a primary against President Obama.  Not afraid to speak his mind, this Congressional Independent.  Too bad we can't clone Sanders!

Naturally, we all would like to surround ourselves with those who are more like us.  It's human logic, human nature - call it what you will.  Since I am not in Congress, it obviously isn't exactly "surrounding myself" I'm concerned about here, but it's all about seeing the nation better represented - of course, by those who think more as I do.  Often that means, to me, simply stating it as "those who think."  Yes, it is unfortunate for us all, but I absolutely reject for the most part the concept that either a Democratic or Republican politician can allow him/herself to think and act in any way that contradicts party politics.  My personal guess is that once a person gets elected as a major party representative, more than 90% of the thinking(!) is done by the party and the individual veers from the party line rarely and at his/her own peril.

Is there such a thing even possible to consider as a perfect Congress?  No, there cannot be, in the truest sense, because that body is constructed of just people and people are far from perfect.  Still, the very reason to have a Congress, in our constitutionally based society, is to have capable people gathered to represent all of us in legislating the direction in which we all are to be governed.  It seems to come as a given expectation that this body of representatives should meld into something more perfect than just the sum of its imperfect parts.  Decent and dedicated folks who truly do want to represent us all and act on behalf of the whole of our nation should by virtue of that call to decency and gravity, become better humans in support of the body politic.

With this in mind, and knowing (as I am confident I do know and my knowledge is empirical), that our two-party power structure is marginally effective due to infighting and hugging party lines, I feel strongly that my concept would work.  Perfect?  No, it cannot be.  Far better for our nation?  Absolutely.

My concept is probably far too idealistic to ever hope we might see it happen, and of course, it would never be constructed purposely within the national legislature.  But maybe it should be.  Each body of the congress should be generally made up of three self-balancing groups: Republicans, Democrats and Independents.  There could have been placed in the constitution, (could still be by amendment) some limiting language that would prevent massive over-loads of any one party.  It would be simple to have a limit of 40% of any one party making up a legislative body.  If that meant that today, the House of Representatives were made up of exactly 40% Dems, 40% GOP and 20% Independents, think how many more bills would get handled with fairness and proper discussion on the merits of the legislation.  My personal preference would be that ALL of the representatives would be Independents, but it's not what I advocate because as an Independent, I am able to recognize that the resultant free-thinking mass would not be any more workable in a practical way than is the current mess created by the two-party structure.

Perfect, in my practical view then, would be to have 40% of any legislative body made up of Independents, 30% Republicans and 30% Democrats.  This would clearly place the onus of persuasive reasoning and convincing argument upon either of the major parties to attract the required majority vote numbers by tapping into the pool of independent thinkers on any issue.  What a beautiful world this would be!