Colonial Governments
99
to be a part of the American political tradition at both the Federal and
State levels down to the present.
The idea behind this principle of representation is the belief that a local resident or ‘‘home town boy,’’ as the Americans say, is more likely to
have a sympathetic understanding of the wants, needs, and interests of
the people in a given community than an outsider. In sharp contrast to
England, where the population is homogeneous and concentrated, the
United States has always been more culturally diverse, even within a single State, with a population that is partly urban but is also significantly
rural, scattered across vast expanses of territory that dwarf the British
Isles. In such a society, the residency requirement helps to satisfy the
need for familiarity and shared values between the representative and
his constituents.
An important feature of the English theory of representation that was
continued in the colonies and in the Constitution of 1787 was the principle of geographical representation, which asserts the view that a legislator does not represent just people as such, but people in a broader cultural sense, including their localities and their way of life. It is reflected
not only in the residency requirement that grew out of our colonial experience but also in the representational basis of Congress designed by
the Framers. Thus the theory of representation embodied in the Constitution rejects absolute political equality and seeks instead to balance the
population and geographical principles. The system of representation in
the Senate, for example, gives each State the same number of Senators, irrespective of the size of the State’s population. Likewise, the House of Representatives, though apportioned on the basis of population, includes at
least one Congressman from each State, irrespective of population.
The principle of geographical representation has also served over the
years as a check on overbearing majorities. It protects the minority rural
population from the multitudes of city dwellers; it gives the small town
or village a voice in the formulation of public policy; and it encourages a
broad representation of different points of view. In recent years, however,
the Supreme Court has taken a different view. In Gray v. Sanders (1963),
the Court ruled that ‘‘The conception of political equality from the Declaration of Independence, to Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, to the Fif-