JAMES BUCHANAN, GORDON TULLOCK, AND THE “RADICALLY IRRESPONSIBLE” ONE PERSON, ONE VOTE DECISIONS

Abstract

James Buchanan and Gordon Tullock took a keen interest in the United States Supreme Court’s reapportionment decisions of the 1960s, which established a “one person, one vote” standard for state legislative apportionment. This paper traces the long arc of Buchanan and Tullock’s opposition to the “one person, one vote” standard.The Calculus of Consentoffers a highly qualified efficiency argument against “one person, one vote,” but over time Buchanan and Tullock grew even more vocally critical of the decisions. Buchanan ultimately advocated a constitutional amendment overturning “one person, one vote” in a private set of recommendations to Congressional Republicans. This paper additionally assesses Tullock’s 1987 complaint that scholars and judges neglectedThe Calculus of Consent’s analysis of reapportionment. A review of the reapportionment literature between 1962 and 1987 demonstrates that whileThe Calculus of Consentwas frequently cited, the literature generally ignored its analysis of the efficiency of apportionment standards.