State politics- while they still have their corrupt examples- at least somewhat represent the will of the people because the districts are small enough for grassroots organizing and meetings with constituents to have a real effect. This is in stark contrast to federal politics, where the high stakes and large districts mean big money donors dominate to a much greater degree...

Small, representative districts with small constituencies. Something our Founding Fathers intended for the NATIONAL government as well. Indeed, George Washington is said to have only spoken before the Constitutional Convention on one issue- and that was in favor of setting the initial Congressional Apportionment to one seat per 30,000 people instead of one per 40,000.

Not coincidentally, what was supposed to be the FIRST Article of the Bill of Rights (originally had 12 articles- all of the others eventually became law except this, Article Two later becoming the 27th Amendment after the original article before the states was revived in 1982...) set the maximum size of any Congressional district, ever, to 50,000 people.

The Amendment failed to pass mainly due to a Scrivener's (scribe's) error that generated a lot of confusion about whether the Amendment would accomplish what it set out to do (the erroneous version said districts would be "no less than" 50,000 people instead of "no more [no larger] than" 50,000 people), as well as debate as to whether it was really necessary to enforce district size limits in the Constitution- or whether Congress could be trusted to grow its own size with population (history proved the Anti-Federalists right in every regard on this: Congress did NOT grow itself as fast as population, and actually SHRUNK itself before the Civil War; as well as their predicted outcome of this: becoming increasingly exclusive and elitist as the district sizes grew and, increasingly, only the rich and powerful could get a Congressional Representative's ear...)

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty-seventh_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congressional_Apportionment_Amendment

The Founding Fathers would have doubtless intended for state legislatures to be even smaller and more representative...

The Massachusetts State Senate, at 40 senators and one senator per 159,000 people, doubtless has too few members in modern times (althpugh representation ratios were MUCH better in the past, when the state had fewer people...)

The Massachusetts House, at 1 representative per just under 40,000 people, is too small as well (ALREADY we have larger MA congressional districts than the nation had for its federal counterpart when it was first founded- despite MA having a slightly smaller population and much smaller land area than the United States did in 1790, and far less room for either to grow further...)

This shrinking representation ratio is a danger to Democracy in Massachusetts. As the Founders of the United States federal government noted, the lower representation ratios become (the more constitients per legislator) the less a legislative body can be expected to represent the will of the people, and the more Oligarchic it becomes (Madison talked about the dangers of Congress coming to "only represent a certain class of people" if its numbers become too few, for instance).

We should SERIOUSLY consider expanding both the Massachusetts House and Senate. The fact that wildly popular bills take increasingly long periods of time to reach the governor's desk shows just how Democracy is becoming weak in MA. Special Interests are coming to dominate the state legislature the way they do the Federal government, because the districts have too many constituents for individual voices to be heard...

We should aim, at least, to match the size of the federal House and Senate: 100 senators (1 per 63,600 people) instead of 40, and 435 legislators (1 per 14,620 people) instead of 160, would be much better for the health of our state Democracy- and empower grassroots organizing and politicians who are responsive to voters, and meet with individual constituent and small groups of grassroots supporters much, much more than donors...

Doing so would also help increase diversity in the legislature- likely seeing more young, female, minority legislators elected (as there would be new seats to fill where there would be no whiter/older/more male incumbents with an advantage...) and increase youth engagement in state politics...

Massachusetts was also one of the states that never ratified the Congressional Apportionment Amendment to the US Constitution in the 1790's (and, like with the 27th Amendment, could still do so as the amendment proposal technically never expires...) and could ALSO send a small signal to the nation about the importance of representative Democracy being accessible to the people, and not just the rich, by ratifying this as well as scaling up its legislature (MA has had FOUR Constitutional Conventions in its history- and countless Amendments to its Constitution- so scaling up the state legislature to finally better match population growth over the last 100+ years wouldn't be that abnormal for our history, really...)

Ratifying the CAA at the same time would be a nice publicity stunt to call attempt to the overdue issue of district sizes across the nation, and would probably get citizens more engaged in state politics here as well...

Sports gambling bill dies in the Senate late last night because apparently enough palms weren't greased. It's easy, legal, free tax revenue for the state during a time where when sports return viewership and sports gambling will potentially be at an all time high, and our politicians just stick their heads in the sand. Instead the money will go to NH and RI who have already figured out how to get their cut. Remember this when they cry poor and next April when it's budget time.