Nice response, Publius. Interesting thoughts on how to give D.C. representation. Ideal? Maybe not, but you've given it a lot more thorough thought than I have.
Another question on the matter: does the current situation (or the one you proposed) fully avoid the problems that Madison feared? Madison claims that there is a certain set of people who should not be represented in Congress. But, as we've pointed out, commuters muck things up. People who belong in this set DO have congressional representation since they can live outside the city limits of DC. Should there be a system in place that takes these people's representation away?
This leads down the road of defining this set of people not by where they live, but instead by who they are. So, why not apply that method across the board? Give DC residents full representation, but the only people who can vote are those not among this set of people that Madsion claims should not have representation.
Granted, figuring out who that set of people is might be impossible, and actually implementing this scheme could be doubly impossible. But hey who we kidding, it ain't gonna happen anyway.
