From the CED video entitled "Democracy In Time:"

In a speech to the National Press Club on Feb. 13, 1997, Eleanor Smeal, President of the Feminist Majority Foundation, pointed out that "Only about 11% of the U.S. Congress and 22% of the state legislators are women." She advocated a Voting Rights Act for Women that would guarantee women 50% of our elective positions. Several other nations have already moved in this direction.

Minority ethnic, racial, and other identity groups--and small political parties--in the United States have even less representation.

Most of the brand new democracies opt for some form of proportional representation modeled after those practiced in Western Europe. One way of measuring the effectiveness of different forms of representation is to count the percentage of eligible voters who help elect candidates of their choice. In the 1994 elections to the U.S. House of Representatives only about 22% of eligible voters helped with their votes to elect candidates. In contrast, over 75% of Germanyšs eligible voters in their 1994 elections with their system of proportional representation helped to elect candidates. At the same time German voters had a far wider range of choice than the typical choice between two candidates provided U.S. Voters.

Proposed Solution: proportional representation for all minorities, small political parties, and both genders tends to bring more people into the political process and would result in dramatically improved decision-making by our legislative bodies. Proportional representation for at least one house in every bicameral legislature would satisfy minimal requirements for fair representation and would not require an amendment to the federal constitution.

"Preference score" voting methods (ways of voting whereby a person is able to rank preferred choices) also provide results that more accurately reflect the peoplešs choices.

The Story of Modern Democracy (to be cont.):