Why Do We Even Have a Senate

Wyoming has fewer than 600,000 people. California has about 39 million. They each get two senators. That’s not a glitch somebody forgot to fix. It was the deal that kept the Constitutional Convention from falling apart in 1787.

In this video

• The Virginia Plan vs. the New Jersey Plan
• The Delaware delegate who threatened to find a foreign ally
• The July 2, 1787 tie vote, and the two delegates who made it a tie
• Roger Sherman and the Connecticut Compromise
• Why state legislatures picked senators until 1913
• The Delaware deadlock that left the state with no senators at all
• The 17th Amendment
• The one line in the Constitution you can’t amend away

Wyoming and California each get two senators. Some folks think that’s fair, and some think it’s crazy. Either way, it was the price of getting the Constitution signed.