TIME FOR A UNICAMERAL LEGISLATURE?

California needs to change the way it does business. Gridlock has become the mainstay of the state’s infrastructure. So complex are the workings of the twohouse Legislature and its myriad committees and subcommittees that the “process” often resembles a pingpong game without end. If a bill wends its way out of one subcommittee, it may well be stuck in perpetuity in another. And if a bill should be fortunate enough to escape one house, it may well suffer demise in the other. Meanwhile, the state’s population is now so large that each Assemblymember has 467,500 constituents; the districts of state senators now hold 925,000 people—larger even than the districts of members of the House of Representatives, which stand at roughly 650,000. So, just as things are more complicated than ever, “representation” becomes more and more of a myth because of huge districts. Some of this makes sense. After all, the framers set up two houses of Congress to reflect the different interests within large and small states both in terms of populations and land mass. One house would never be able to move proposed laws forward without consent of the other. But the states have worked differently since the Supreme Court handed down Reynolds v. Sims in 1964, a case that determined both houses of state legislatures should be apportioned by population.

There is a way to deal with both of the problems described above: recast the Legislature into a single, or unicameral, body. Radical? Perhaps, but long overdue.

Let’s get to the ping-pong issue first. With a two-house or bicameral Legislature, the endless number of obstacles makes it difficult for most proposals to work their way through the process, with many shunted aside long before anyone knows their contents. A unicameral Legislature would streamline the number of committees and subcommittees by half, thereby facilitating disposition of proposed legislation on a faster track—one way or the other. Critics will counter that the streamlined process will allow bad legislation through (as if all legislation is good under the present process?), but proposals will still go through different committees before passage as well as face scrutiny from the governor, should they reach his desk. And if they’re really bad, the courts will still be there to assess constitutional issues.

Now the question of representation. With 37 million people and a budget in excess of $140 billion, California resembles a nation more than a state. The distance between elected officials and the people has soared as well. Should the Legislature become unicameral, each of the 120 legislators (80 in the Assembly and 40 in the Senate) would have districts with slightly more than 300,000 residents. Sure, it’s not the coziness of a town council, but the system would greatly reduce the number of citizens per legislator. Such reductions would not assure better representation, but they would reduce some of the barriers to people seeking representation, without adding to the cost of running the state Legislature. In fact, without the duplication of committees and subcommittees, the costs would be reduced.

The fact is that there is no magic pill for assuring a responsive Legislature. But doing “more of the same” when it doesn’t work isn’t too swift either. Sometimes, looking outside the box allows for a better box. In this case, it at least may open up the process. It’s worth a thought.

Larry N. Gerston is a professor of political science at San Jose State University and political analyst at NBC11.