The Libertarian Case for Expanding the House of Representatives
A Clarification to the Confusion
“Wait...a libertarian wants to make Congress bigger?”
This is the typical first response whenever the topic of house expansion is brought up. But to clarify, we Libertarians want more representatives, not more government. Libertarians fundamentally oppose concentrated power. If you believe monopolies are dangerous in the marketplace, why would you defend one in politics?
The House of Representatives was designed to dilute political power by spreading it among representatives who actually knew their constituents. When the Constitution was being ratified, each member represented roughly 30,000 people. Today, it’s closer to 760,000. The U.S. Population has more than tripled since 1929, and yet, Congress has kept the House capped at 435 seats.
Perverse Incentives
A representative who serves 30,000 people can meet with them; they can knock on doors, hold town halls, and build trust one conversation at a time.
A representative who serves 760,000 people cannot.
This type of representative needs television ads, digital marketing, consultants, polling firms, fundraising operations, and millions of dollars. Here, politics stops being a conversation and instead becomes an industry. This doesn’t require a shadowy cabal or secret conspiracy. Incentives are enough.
When representation becomes scarce, political influence becomes valuable. The people with the resources to buy that influence naturally gain the loudest voice: big Pharma protects its patents, defense contractors lobby for the next weapons program, entertainment companies extend copyrights, financial institutions shape banking regulations—every major industry with billions on the line invests heavily in Washington because the return on investment is enormous. Granted, the voters are still involved, but they’re seen more as an audience to persuade, rather than citizens to represent. This helps explain why government keeps growing regardless of which party wins. Both major parties promise to fight special interests while both depend on them.
The Political Market Artifice
Libertarians often argue that markets work because competition prevents monopolies from becoming entrenched—politics is no different. Artificially limiting the number of representatives creates an artificial scarcity, artificial scarcity creates rents, political rents attract lobbyists, lobbyists write legislation, government grows.
Intellectual property law is one of the clearest examples.
The Constitution authorizes patents and copyrights only for limited times and only to promote the progress of science and the useful arts. The purpose wasn’t to create permanent monopolies, it was to encourage innovation. Instead, copyright terms have been extended repeatedly over the last century, often just as valuable works were approaching the public domain. For example, pharmaceutical companies routinely engage in patent evergreening, making minor changes that can delay generic competition for years. Another example are software patents, which are more likely used to threaten competitors with expensive litigation, and less likely used to protect invention. Whether you’re talking about Disney, Pfizer, or a patent troll, the pattern is the same: politically connected incumbents use government-granted privileges to reduce competition. A free market cannot exist when government is deciding who gets decades of legal exclusivity.
Finance and Foreign Affairs
The aforementioned incentives found within politics also helps explain America’s foreign policy. Poll after poll show that Americans are weary of endless wars and open-ended military commitments, yet Washington almost always finds another intervention, another deployment, another emergency requiring another appropriation.
Peace is popular, but war is profitable.
When the benefits of intervention are concentrated among well-organized interests, with the costs are spread—across taxpayers, future generations, and military families—Washington predictably chooses intervention. Again, no conspiracy required, just incentives.
What Does Expanding the House Do For Us?
Expanding the House changes the economics of politics.
Smaller districts mean cheaper campaigns, and cheaper campaigns mean ordinary people have a realistic chance to run. Not only this, but Representatives become more accessible, constituents become harder to ignore, special interests must persuade thousands of lawmakers instead of concentrating resources on just 435, and the value of buying political influence falls because political influence is no longer artificially scarce.
That’s exactly how competition is supposed to work.
This isn’t about making government bigger, it’s about making political power harder to capture. If libertarians believe concentrated economic power should face competition, we should believe the same about political power. Expanding the House is one of the few reforms that actually decentralizes authority; it makes representation more local, it makes campaigns less dependent on massive fundraising, and makes government less valuable as a tool for rent-seeking.
I believe that’s a reform worth fighting for.
If you agree with these viewpoints, visit us at our website to learn more and take action today—and while you’re at it, check us out on Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, Discord, Reddit, and X. We appreciate your viewership!
—Dan McCarthy, Texas
Edited by Matt Beyer
Nice article Dan. I especially liked your tie in to finance/foreign affairs and 'Peace is popular, but war is profitable'. I had not thought of how uncapping the House can impact our foreign policy and vast, unaudited military expenditures.