One of the great battles of the Constitutional Convention was about government representation among small states vs big states. The Electoral College was one outcome of that issue. So was Congress’ composition – a House, represented in proportion to population; but a Senate, with an identical two Senators per state. Thus, the Senate represented both small states and big states in exactly the same way. This overall arrangement may have made sense when the US had 4 million people in 1790, but no longer.
Today, the biggest problem with Senate representation is the population disparity among states but with unbalanced party trends. Less populated states, such as those in the Midwest and eastern West tend to be Republican. There are currently 20 red states, 14 blue states and 16 purple states. That makes 40 reliably Republican Senators, 28 Democrats, and with Gerrymandering, a good portion of 32 Senators likely to be Republican. The Senate is now a purely political body. It is not representative, and it is more likely than not to be Republican.
Given the authorities of the Senate, such as unilateral (i.e., not also the House) consent for judges and ambassadors, this means that such non-elected parts of our government will evolve to align with only one particular party, as opposed to according to the will of the general electorate. Regardless of politically-biased arguments about this either way, it is doubtful this was the intent of the Founders.
If the intent was/is to align the courts, diplomacy, and treaties with the will of the electorate, Congress’ authorities should be reversed. The House should have authorities of advice and consent, not the Senate.
In the US, the Senate seems to be viewed as the superior branch of Congress. Senators seem to think so. One might argue just the opposite, however – what purpose does the Senate serve? If each Senator represents half the population (not really true because both Senators represent a state’s entire population), a California Senator represents 20 Million people, while a Wyoming Senator represents 300,000 people. But they have equal votes to legislate and consent. Another way to view this is that California and New York get 4 votes in the Senate but represent nearly 20% of the population. Again putting aside political arguments either way (e.g., urban areas tend to be more liberal, but don’t represent “American values”), what purpose does the Senate serve if it is not representative of the electorate?
This Senate-House imbalance for representation is just one example of presumably unintended consequences of the Constitution. The Electoral College and Gerrymandering are two others. Did the Founders intend that a President could be elected without a majority of the popular vote? Manipulation of “representative” districts by the party in charge to maximize their chance of staying in charge could not possibly have been the intent of the Founders. George Washington warned of the dangers of political parties, so at least one Founder did not intend this consequence. And of course, no Founder intended the vitriol found in government today.