Law Professor Richard Pildes here presents a plan to add 150 more members of the U.S. House. The new members would be elected statewide, or possibly in large regions of each state that would elect 3 or 4 members. The new members would be chosen in a manner to create proportional representation between each of the two major parties. If the previous statewide vote for U.S. House in a particular state showed that 60% of the electorate favored Republicans, then the new members would be seated so as to create a total delegation from that state in which 60% of the members were Republicans. This aspect would eliminate incentives for state legislatures to draw gerrymandered districts.

It’s unfortunate that his plan doesn’t include minor parties into the proportional system. Also the system doesn’t really work unless a state has party nominees for U.S. House, which is not the case in Alaska, California, Louisiana and Washington.

Last week, a Pennsylvania state trial court interpreted the election code to not require write-in candidates for party office to get a minimum of ten write-in votes in the primary. See this story. The law appears to contradict itself on the minimum number of write-ins needed to be seated. One part of the law sets a minimum number of write-ins, but another part of the law says that whoever gets the most write-ins can be seated, regardless of how few write-ins they receive.

On July 20, a Tennessee state trial court ruled that the Democratic Party is allowed to block a candidate from its primary on the grounds that the party doesn’t believe the candidate is a bona fide Democxrat. Elizabeth Stephens wanted to run for U.S. House, 5th district, but the party had rejected her. She sued but did not win the lawsuit. See this story.

Tennessee does not have registration by party. The voter registration does not ask about party membership.