If we want to change this country, we have to understand this country – starting with the US government
And I know we were supposed to have learned the basics in school – or at least remembered it – but many of us either don’t remember or weren’t really paying attention in the first place…
So lets start at the basics and keep up – I’m going to move quickly so we don’t all fall asleep…
Here is Government 101 in 2 minutes
There are 3 branches of US Government
The Legislative Branch
The Executive Branch
And the Judicial Branch
The Legislative branch is made up of the US House of Representatives and the US Senate
The Executive branch is the President and Vice President
And the Judicial branch is our Supreme Court
We’re going to concentrate on the Legislative branch
also known as Congress
There are two branches of the Legislative branch – the House of Representatives – which has 435 people
And the US Senate – which has 100 people
And as you probably know, each state gets 2 US Senators
But lets talk about the House of Representatives that has 435 members
I’m naturally curious and wanted to understand why are there exactly 435 members of the US House?
It turns out that in 1929 they created this thing called the Permanent Apportionment Act – and since then, the house has always and most like will always have exactly 435 members.
Unlike the way each state equally has 2 US Senators – the 435 seats in the House of Representatives are divvied out to each state based on their population.
So after a census, if a state’s population increases then they get more members from their state in the US House of Representatives – or if their population decreased, they get few representatives….
Here is a map from the last census and you can see how many people from your state are in the US House of Representatives.
Each state gets at least 1 btw…. And as you can see, here in Texas, of the 435 peeps in the US House. Of Representatives, 36 of those are proud Texans.
We’re going to talk about how all of our numbers are going to change after the 2020 census in the next video…
Until the next Two Minute Take – choose Country over Party – State over Party and stay curious, not angry!
I am Gina Fant-Simon – and thanks for watching and thanks for waking up with me.
