Neighborhood Ministries

The members of the House of Representatives are reapportioned after each Census to ensure that each Representative represents approximately an equal number of voters.  Since illegal immigrants cannot vote legally, it was felt they should not be included in the Census. Liberals claim that the Founding Fathers wanted everyone counted, not just voters and refer to the 1787 Compromise where they allowed slaves to be counted as three fifths for the Census. The Continental Congress was debating the apportionment of taxes for each State which was determined by population. The Northern States wanted the slaves counted as part of the population so the Southern States would pay their fair share but the Southern States didn’t want them counted in order to reduce their taxes. They finally reached a compromise where the slaves would be counted as three fifths of a person. Indians were excluded from the count until 1860 when those living off the reservations were counted and in 1900, they began counting Indians on the reservations. The Census was also used to determine seats in the House of Representatives and the electoral college The Census counted every resident except foreign nationals visiting or temporarily working in the United States.  The 14th Amendment conferred citizenship on all residents born in the United States or naturalized and nothing in the Constitution precludes counting non-citizens in the Census. Apportionments for the House of Representatives is based on the total resident population of the fifty States.  The total number of representatives has been set at 441. 435 from the 50 States and one from the District of Columbia and each of the five US territories. Liberals claim the illegal immigrants should be counted because they are losing population as residents flee the State and are replacing them with illegal immigrants who will vote for Democrats I return for being allowed to stay. Conservatives feel that it unfairly gives Congressional seats to liberal States and deprives legal voters of representation since the immigrants are not here legally. It was designed to give equal representation to all but it is not equal representation if two districts have the same population but one has very few voters because most are illegal and can’t vote legally.

AB-AI Many States are already gearing up for the primary elections. Many people skip the primaries or vote casually without a lot of concern for who wins. They think one is as good as the other. That is generally true for Democrats who are pressured to vote for things the party supports and against what it opposes, because they are supported by big money interests such as Planned Parenthood who dictate how they vote, regardless of the feelings of their constituents. That is not as true for Republicans who rely on party members for support and are more influenced by community values. Yet the primaries dictate who will be on the ballot in November. If you don’t agree with who you elect in the primaries, you don’t get to pick a second choice in November. We are seeing an increasing number of people who say they don’t agree with either candidate in November. It takes work to locate what candidates stand for but it is much better than suffering through the results of legislation pushed through that supports causes you don’t believe in. You won’t agree with everything a politician supports but you should at least agree with their major values, You have an obligation to let him know how you feel on an issue when you disagree with his stand. If he hears from enough constituents, he may change his vote. You can’t go on what they say, you have to look at their record of how they voted in the past. They can say anything they want while campaigning but the bills they vote for tell what they support and that is in the public record. A candidate may say they oppose abortion but if they vote for funding for abortion, you know they support it. If he gets in and doesn’t vote the way you wanted, you have an obligation to vote him out and replace him with someone better. Too many voters don’t pay attention to how their representative votes. They go on reelecting him  and he goes on padding his pockets because he knows he can still get reelected. The problems in Minnesota, California, New York and many other States, as well as many major cities didn’t pop up overnight, they have been going on for years. However, residents of those States have continued to reelect the same corrupt politicians because they either aren’t paying attention, don’t care, or the election process in their State is so corrupted that the party in power overrules them.