Have you ever thought about what it would be like to be a congressperson? Seems fun right? Sitting around and getting paid to argue with people much like a lawyer does, while also being in charge of the country more so than the president is, but it’s very different from that. Being a congressman is a very difficult job, having to argue with many people over what you think is obviously the right way to run the country, not just random things. However, congress tends to do things in their own interest and not in the interest of the American people, even when it would be very easy to do the right thing, many wanting to relinquish their powers to the president, and oftentimes not voting for bills that would help the common person in America, which leads me to one conclusion; our congressional system sucks, and desperately needs to be changed.

Starting off small, they haven’t used their checks and balances much. A good portion of our congressmen are hardcore Republicans who got help from Trump to get into office, leading to an unfair support for the president who openly doesn’t want to support the people, another good portion is Democrats and Republicans who blindly support their party without much thought. So, when the president does something unconstitutional (like threatening to be a dictator in office, constantly lying in his position, making new government bodies without consulting congress then putting his billionaire friend in charge without a vote, removing protections for minorities via executive order, etc.), congress won’t do anything about it, they either sit around and cheer or can’t make up their mind if they want to do what’s best for the country or not. Though, it’s not all that bad, the judicial branch has been using their checks and balances very effectively so far, keeping things somewhat held together.

Despite how I just said congress won’t get much done, that’s not entirely true, they go through with proposing bills and laws that are questionable in their morality at best. Let’s look at H.R.722, this bill simply proposes (from my understanding) that all fetus, whether they be six months or 2 weeks old, are all considered human life, which limits abortion rights for many, disregarding its origin even if it’s through rape or incest. H.R.9218 wants to define what a male and female are, tying them directly with gender and sex, limiting representation for trans people all across the nation. S.5384, returns education back to the states, on pen and paper this seems good, but in reality, would only make the educational gap between various demographics even larger than it already is. H.R.8706, removes protections on fair hiring practices, this specifically would make it harder for many minority groups to get a job simply because they are a part of said minority. Now, these bills may benefit some, yes, BUT they don’t benefit everyone, many of them having direct negative effects on many minorities. Luckily though, most of these bills have not been passed, though some such as S.5384 have been.

And now, for what I feel like is my strongest point, our congressional workers don’t seem to like their power, many wanting to relinquish their power to the president and others just not caring for it. I know this is a very bold claim, but after looking into it, there is a considerable amount of evidence to support this. In the article “Trump and Allies Forge Plans to Increase Presidential Power in 2025“, written by Charlie Savage, Jonathan Swan, and Maggie Haberman, they go over many points detailing how trump and his administration will try to use to centralize power to the president. “Mr. Trump and his associates have a broader goal: to alter the balance of power by increasing the president’s authority over every part of the federal government that now operates, by either law or tradition, with any measure of independence from political interference by the White House, according to a review of his campaign policy proposals and interviews with people close to him.”, essentially saying Trump wants power everywhere, of course this wouldn’t be an issue if congressmen didn’t support it, unfortunately many do hence why they voted him into office. Looking at a different article “Sex, Drinking and Dementia: 25 Lawmakers Spill on What Congress Is Really Like“, different interviews are taken by various reporters and congressmen in which they discuss they how congress really is. a representative from West Virginia, Riley Moore states “The worst thing about the Democratic Party is that I think there’s a number of them in the conference who honestly don’t like this country. I think some of them border on hating it, even down to our foundational documents, such as the Constitution.”, this can be interpreted any number of ways, but I see it as some genuinely hating the country as they said, but more so, people distrusting each other enough to where they make more accusations than helping the country run.

Of course, I can’t say all this without a counter argument, and the best one being that it’s congress, they have to argue, and people won’t usually agree. Many congressional workers really believe that what they are doing is better, but maybe not the best. Looking back at “Sex, Drinking and Dementia: 25 Lawmakers Spill on What Congress Is Really Like”, Tom Cole, a representative from Oklahoma says “seriously, I think you really either love your job or you don’t. I don’t think people that think they’re doing the country a favor, or that they’re sacrificing to serve, last very long.”, more or less stating that, if they want to last in congress they have to make some bad choices, most congressmen who think they are actually changing much don’t understand much of what they are doing. Realistically, this does excuse some of the issues with congress, it’s all debate and from some rough calculations I’ve done congress sees 23912 bills per year, 65.5 bills per day, roughly 5.5 bills per hour, just under 11 minutes per bill in a 12-hour workday. They have very little time to decide on big choices for the country, so it makes sense that things are slow to change or improve, all things considered.

If you look at everything so far, you should realize that this system isn’t working properly, they have too much to do in too little of time, meaning they need some changes to counter this. Now I will agree, yes, we are a functioning government at this time, but due to how poorly two of our three branches are using their powers it is time we change things. My best idea for a good change would be to double congress, have one congressional system see one half of bills while the other see a different half of bills, this could help add more time to congressional debates, leading to more “good” bills being passed. Of course, I am only a High Schooler, so my ideas might not be the best, and I might not understand things as well as I think I do, but I hope this provokes some thoughts, good or bad.

grawha

I’m a high school student who plays the trumpet. I like Star Wars, especially the politics of it, and the politics of the world. I like to compare real world issues to Star Wars, sometimes other fictional universes, in order to explain my views on things to others.