At-large

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At large (before a noun: at-large) is a description for members of a governing body who are elected or appointed to represent a whole membership or population (notably a city, county, state, province, nation, club or association), rather than a subset. In multi-hierarchical bodies, the term rarely extends to a tier beneath the highest division. A contrast is implied, with certain electoral districts or narrower divisions. It can be given to the associated territory, if any, to denote its undivided nature, in a specific context. Unambiguous synonyms are the prefixes of cross-, all- or whole-, such as cross-membership, or all-state.

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The term is used as a suffix referring to specific members (such as the U.S. congressional Representative/the Member/Rep. for Wyoming at large). It figures as a generic prefix of its subject matter (such as Wyoming is an at-large U.S. congressional district, at present). It is commonly used when making or highlighting a direct contrast with subdivided equivalents that may be past or present, or seen in exotic comparators. It indicates that the described zone has no further subsets used for the same representative purpose. An exception is a nil-exceptions arrangement of overlapping tiers (resembling or being district and regional representatives, one set of which is at large) for return to the very same chamber, and consequent issue of multiple ballots for plural voting to every voter. This avoids plural voting competing with single voting in the jurisdiction, an inherent different level of democratic power.

Examples of a democratic power disparity were found in a small number of states at certain U.S. Congresses, between 1853 and 1967, and in the old lower houses of the United Kingdom and Ireland, whereby certain voters could vote for (and lobby) at-large (whole-state/County) and district(-based) representatives to them, giving zones of plural voting and thus representation contrasting with zones, for the same national assembly, of single voting and representation. [1] [2] In 1964 the U.S. Supreme Court banned such plural voting for the U.S. Congress (thus banning at-large, whole-state congressional districts which overlap state subdivision congressional districts).

Universal principles apply regardless whether election(s) are for a member at large, or not.

Canada

Some municipalities in Canada elect part or all of their city councils at large. The form of municipal election is widespread in small towns to avoid "them and us" cultural dissociation of dividing them into wards. It is also used in many large cities in Canada. The voting method in all at-large elections and multi-member wards today is Plurality block voting. (In the past, Single transferable voting (STV) was used in 20 Canadian municipalities, either in at-large contests or multi-member wards.) Notable larger instances are, from west to east:

The three territories (Yukon, Nunavut, and the Northwest Territories) are federally served in the Parliament of Canada by one at-large Member of Parliament and Senator each. These have high apportionment but are ethnically diverse and of exceptional geographical size. Provinces are divided to make up the other 335 electoral districts (ridings or comtés). The ridings are combined into large regions to select the 102 senators, who are appointed.

Israel

In Israel, elections for the Knesset (the national parliament) are conducted at large by proportional representation from party lists. Election of municipal and town (but not regional) councils are on the same basis.

Netherlands

In the Netherlands, elections for the House of Representatives (the lower house of the States-General, the national parliament) are conducted at large by proportional representation from party lists.

Philippines

This manner of election applies to the Senate. All voters can cast twelve votes to refresh half of the Senate, namely twelve senators, from a longer list of candidates. The simple tally determines the winners (plurality-at-large voting).

Provinces with smaller populations elect their representative at large. Some cities that has its own congressional district also elect its representatives this way. Most other provinces and a few cities are divided into two or more districts.

Likewise, the Sangguniang Kabataan (Youth Councils), Sangguniang Barangay (Village Councils), Sangguniang Bayan (Municipal Councils) and some Sangguniang Panlungsod (City Councils) elect the other members. It follows that such true or quasi-local government units do not in the purest sense elect members at large when their geography is analysed, as each member co-exists with the others who have territorial overlap, as representing greater or lower-rank districts. The members are by law chosen by the public directly or indirectly. Members chosen by the City Council or the Sangguniang Panlalawigan (Provincial Board) are elected such that the city or province may be split into as many as seven districts, and each then elects at least two members.

United States

Article One of the United States Constitution provides for direct election of members of the House of Representatives. The Uniform Congressional District Act, enacted in 1967 and codified as 2 U.S.C.   § 2c, dictates that representatives must be elected from geographical districts and that these must be single-member districts. Indeed it confirms when the state has a single representative, that will be a representative at large.

U.S. House of Representatives

States as at-large congressional districts

Former at-large congressional districts

Non-voting at-large congressional districts

Former non-voting at-large congressional districts

Simultaneous at-large and sub-state-size congressional districts

This is a table of every such instance. It shows the situation applied to a small, varying group of states in three periods. The 33rd Congress began in 1853; it ended two years later. The 38th began in 1863; the 50th ended in 1889. The 53rd began in 1893; the 89th ended in January 1967, the final such period. This was due to the 1964 case of Reynolds v. Sims : the United States Supreme Court determined that the general basis of apportionment must be "one person, one vote." [4]

CongressState & Number of at-large seats
33rd MS (1)
38th IL (1)
39th IL (1)
40th IL (1)
41st IL (1)
42nd IL (1)
43rd AL (2), AR (1), IN (2), LA (1), NY (1), PA (3), SC (1), TN (1), TX (2)
44th AL (2)
48th AR (1), CA (2), GA (1), KS (4), NY (1), NC (1), PA (1), VA (1)
49th PA (1)
50th PA (1)
53rd IL (2), KS (1), PA (2)
54th KS (1), PA (2)
55th KS (1), PA (2)
56th KS (1), PA (2)
57th KS (1), PA (2)
58th CO (1), CT (1), KS (1)
59th CO (1), CT (1), KS (1)
60th CO (1), CT (1)
61st CO (1), CT (1)
62nd CO (1), CT (1)
63rd AL (1), CO (2), FL (1), IL (2), MI (1), MN (1), OH (1), OK (3), PA (4), TX (2), WA (2), WV (1)
64th AL (1), IL (2), PA (4), TX (2), WV (1)
65th IL (2), PA (4), TX (2)
66th IL (2), PA (4)
67th IL (2), PA (4)
68th IL (2)
69th IL (2)
70th IL (2)
71st IL (2)
72nd IL (2)
73rd CT (1), FL (1), IL (2), NY (2), OH (2), OK (1), TX (3)
74th CT (1), FL (1), IL (2), NY (2), OH (2), OK (1)
75th CT (1), IL (2), NY (2), OH (2), OK (1)
76th CT (1), IL (2), NY (2), OH (2), OK (1)
77th CT (1), IL (2), NY (2), OH (2), OK (1)
78th CT (1), FL (1), IL (1), NY (2), OH (1), PA (1)
79th CT (1), IL (1), OH (1)
80th CT (1), IL (1), OH (1)
81st CT (1), OH (1)
82nd CT (1), OH (1)
83rd CT (1), TX (1), WA (1)
84th CT (1), TX (1), WA (1)
85th CT (1), TX (1), WA (1)
86th CT (1)
87th CT (1)
88th AL (8), CT (1), MD (1), MI (1), OH (1), TX (1)
89th MD (1), OH (1), TX (1)

State elections

As of 2021, ten U.S. states have at least one legislative chamber which uses multi-winner at-large districts:

In the 1980s, Florida, Hawaii, Illinois, South Carolina, and Virginia all moved entirely from multi-winner districts in either chamber, followed by Alaska, Georgia, and Indiana in the 1990s. [5] After the 2010 United States redistricting cycle, Nevada eliminated their two remaining multi-member senate districts and implemented single-winner districts in both houses. [6] In 2018, West Virginia passed a law switching all remaining multi-winner House of Delegates seats to single-winner districts following the 2020 United States Census. [7]

Local elections

Since passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and lessening of some historic barriers to voter registration and voting, legal challenges have been made based on at-large election schemes at the county or city level, including in school board elections, in numerous jurisdictions where minorities had been effectively excluded from representation on local councils or boards. An example is Charleston County, South Carolina, which was sued in 2001 and reached a settlement in 2004. Its county commission changed to nine members elected from single-member districts; in 2015 they included six white Republicans and three African-American Democrats, where the black minority makes up more than one-third of the population.

In another instance, in 2013 Fayette County, Georgia, which had an estimated 70% white majority and 20% black minority, was ordered by a federal district court to develop single-member districts for election of members to its county council and its school board. Due to at-large voting, African Americans had been unable to elect any candidate of their choice to either of these boards for decades. [8] Such local election systems have become subject to litigation since enabling more representative elections can create entry points for minorities and women into the political system and provide more representative government. In the late 1980s, several major cities in Tennessee reached settlement in court cases to adopt single-member districts to enable minorities to elect candidates of their choice to city councils, who had previously been excluded by at-large voting favoring the majority population. [9] By 2015, voters in two of these cities had elected women mayors who had gotten their start in being elected to the city council from single-member districts.

The town of Islip, New York was sued by four residents in 2018 for violating the Voting Rights Act by maintaining a discriminatory at-large council system. One-third of Islip's population is Hispanic, but only one person of color has ever been elected to a town seat. As part of the settlement reached in 2020, the at-large system will be abolished and replaced by four council districts by 2023. [10]

Some states have passed laws that further discourage the use of at-large districts. For example, the California Voting Rights Act removes one of the criteria required for a successful federal Voting Rights Act challenge, which has thus resulted in hundreds of cities, school districts, and special districts moving to single member area-based elections.

Some jurisdictions have kept at-large city councils and boards. The solution adopted by Cambridge, Massachusetts, is to elect council officials via proportional representation for all seats.

European Union

The Conference on the Future of Europe has proposed adding "transnational lists" to the European Parliament, in which a small number of members are elected by the entire European Union at-large from Union-wide party lists. [11] This is among a number of proposed reforms to deepen European integration.

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Proportional representation</span> Voting system that makes outcomes proportional to vote totals

Proportional representation (PR) refers to a type of electoral system under which subgroups of an electorate are reflected proportionately in the elected body. The concept applies mainly to political divisions among voters. The essence of such systems is that all votes cast – or almost all votes cast – contribute to the result and are effectively used to help elect someone – not just a bare plurality or (exclusively) the majority – and that the system produces mixed, balanced representation reflecting how votes are cast.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Single transferable vote</span> Proportional representation voting system

The single transferable vote (STV), sometimes known as proportional ranked choice voting (P-RCV), is a multi-winner electoral system in which each voter casts a single vote in the form of a ranked-choice ballot. Voters have the option to rank candidates, and their vote may be transferred according to alternate preferences if their preferred candidate is eliminated or elected with surplus votes, so that their vote is used to elect someone they prefer over others in the running. STV aims to approach proportional representation based on votes cast in the district where it is used, so that each vote is worth about the same as another.

Single non-transferable vote or SNTV is an electoral system used to elect multiple winners. It is a generalization of first-past-the-post, applied to multi-member districts with each voter casting just one vote. Unlike FPTP, which is a single-winner system, in SNTV multiple winners are elected, typically in electoral districts; additionally, unlike FPTP, SNTV produces mixed representation and makes it unlikely for a single party to take all the seats in a city or a set area, which can happen under FPTP.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">House of Representatives (Japan)</span> Lower house of the National Diet of Japan

An electoral district, also known as an election district, legislative district, voting district, constituency, riding, ward, division, electorate, or (election) precinct, is a subdivision of a larger state created to provide its population with representation in the larger state's legislative body. That body, or the state's constitution or a body established for that purpose, determines each district's boundaries and whether each will be represented by a single member or multiple members. Generally, only voters (constituents) who reside within the district are permitted to vote in an election held there. District representatives may be elected by a first-past-the-post system, a proportional representative system, or another voting method. They may be selected by a direct election under universal suffrage, an indirect election, or another form of suffrage.

Canada holds elections for legislatures or governments in several jurisdictions: for the federal (national) government, provincial and territorial governments, and municipal governments. Elections are also held for self-governing First Nations and for many other public and private organizations including corporations and trade unions. Municipal elections can also be held for both upper-tier and lower-tier governments.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Elections in Japan</span> Political elections for public offices in Japan

The Japanese political process has two types of elections.

Elections in the Philippines are of several types. The president, vice-president, and the senators are elected for a six-year term, while the members of the House of Representatives, governors, vice-governors, members of the Sangguniang Panlalawigan, mayors, vice-mayors, members of the Sangguniang Panlungsod/members of the Sangguniang Bayan, barangay officials, and the members of the Sangguniang Kabataan are elected to serve for a three-year term.

Historically, the single transferable vote (STV) electoral system has seen a series of relatively modest periods of usage and disusage throughout the world; however, today it is seeing increasing popularity and proposed implementation as a method of proportional representation and a goal of electoral reform. STV has been used in many different local, regional and national electoral systems, as well as in various other types of bodies, around the world.

The general ticket, also known as party block voting (PBV) or ticket voting, is a type of block voting in which voters opt for a party, or a team's set list of candidates, and the highest-polling party/team becomes the winner. Unless specifically altered, this electoral system results in the victorious political party receiving 100% of the seats. Rarely used today, the general ticket is usually applied in more than one multi-member district, which theoretically allows regionally strong minority parties to win some seats, but the strongest party nationally still typically wins with a landslide.

A single-member district is an electoral district represented by a single officeholder. It contrasts with a multi-member district, which is represented by multiple officeholders. Single-member districts are also sometimes called single-winner voting, winner-takes-all, single-member constituencies or single-member electorates.

The legislative districts of the Philippines are the divisions of the Philippines' provinces and cities for representation in the various legislative bodies. Congressional districts are for House of Representatives, while there are districts for Sangguniang Panlalawigan, and some Sangguniang Panlungsod. For purposes of representation, the Senate, most Sangguniang Panlungsod, Sangguniang Bayan, Sangguniang Barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan are all elected at-large, although there were districts for the Senate from 1916 to 1935.

The Politics of Aberdeen, Scotland have changed significantly in recent years. In 1996, under the Local Government etc. (Scotland) Act 1994, Grampian Regional Council and Aberdeen District Council were dissolved, creating the new unitary Aberdeen City Council to represent the city's council area.

A plural district was a district in the United States House of Representatives that was represented by more than one member. States using this method elected multiple members from some of their geographically defined districts. They did so on a single ballot or on separate concurrent ballots for each seat. In more modern terms, for less ambiguity, such a district is termed a multi-member district.

The multiple non-transferable vote (MNTV) is a group of voting system, in which voters elect several representatives at once, with each voter having more than one vote. MNTV uses multi-member electoral districts or only one district, which contains all voters, which is used to provide at-large representation.

Plurality block voting, also known as plurality-at-large voting, bloc vote or block voting (BV) is a non-proportional voting system for electing representatives in multi-winner elections. Each voter may cast as many votes as the number of seats to be filled. The usual result when the candidates divide into parties is that the most popular party in the district sees its full slate of candidates elected in a seemingly landslide victory.

Electoral districts go by different names depending on the country and the office being elected.

A majoritarian electoral system is an electoral system where the candidate with the most votes takes the seat using the winner-takes-all principle and in this way provides majoritarian representation. However, there are many electoral systems considered majoritarian based on different definitions, including types of at-large majoritarian representation such as block voting or party block voting, but district-based majoritarian systems such as first-past-the-post voting (FPTP/SMP). Where two candidates are in the running, the one with the most votes will have a majority, but where there are three or more candidates, it often happens that no candidate takes a majority of the votes.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Uniform Congressional District Act</span> American electoral law

The Uniform Congressional District Act is a redistricting bill that requires that all members of the United States House of Representatives in the 91st United States Congress and every subsequent Congress be elected from a single member constituency unless a state had elected all of its previous representatives at large, where this requirement commenced during the 92nd United States Congress.

References

  1. ↑ Electoral Reform in England and Wales, by Charles Seymour (David & Charles Reprints 1970)
  2. ↑ The Parliaments of England by Henry Stooks Smith (1st edition published in three volumes 1844-50), second edition edited (in one volume) by F.W.S. Craig (Political Reference Publications 1973)
  3. ↑ Guide to City Services, Municipal Government, Wards. Retrieved 4 June 2007
  4. ↑ Reynolds v. Sims, 377 U.S. 533 (1964).
  5. ↑ Lilliard E. Richardson, Jr. and Christopher A. Cooper, "The Mismeasure of MMD: Reassessing the Impact of Multi Member Districts on Descriptive Representation in U.S. State Legislatures," accessed May 27, 2015
  6. ↑ National Conference of State Legislatures, "Changes in Legislatures Using Multimember Districts after Redistricting," September 11, 2012
  7. ↑ "Bill Status - Complete Bill History".
  8. ↑ ABS Staff, "Fayette County at-large election process violates the Voting Rights Act", Atlanta Black Star, 22 May 2013, accessed 11 April 2015
  9. ↑ BUCHANAN v. CITY OF JACKSON, 683 F. Supp. 1515 (W.D. Tenn. 1988), Case Text website
  10. ↑ "Latinos, advocates hail change to how Islip officials are elected". Newsday. Retrieved 2020-10-15.
  11. ↑ "The Conference on the Future of Europe concludes its work | News | European Parliament". www.europarl.europa.eu. 2022-09-05. Retrieved 2023-02-05.

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