Apportionment of the House of Representatives

Nothing can be more fallacious than to found our political calculations on arithmetical principles."-The Federalist, No. 55.* This Comment is confined solely to the problem of determining the number of seats in the House which should be alloted to each state, and does not consider the apportioning of that quota to districts within the several states.That latter issue has been coinpetently and exhaustively treated by ScHm-CKEBIER, CONGRESSIONAL ApronTniox ,NT 127-92 (1941), and, more recently, by a Note, 56 YALE L. J. 127 (1946).1.The first of the twelve amendments proposed as a Bill of Rights provided for a gradual change in the maximum number of representatives from one to each thirty thousand population to one to each fifty thousand, 1 STAT.97 (1789), but the amendment was not ratified.President Washington chose the Apportionment Act of 1792 for the first exercise of his veto power, claiming that the apportionment proposed was unconistitutional. 3 ANNALs OF CONG.539 (1792).5 MARSHALL, LIr oF WAsHINGrTON 324 (1807) describes the Presidential veto and the ensuing passage of a bill using a different method of apportionment, and optimistically concludes: "Thus was this interesting part of tile American Constitution finally settled."The four other methods which have since been used in making apportionments and the three additional methods which are currently coinpeting for favor tend to refute Marshall's pronouncement.2.