WHAT IF THE HOUSE
HAD NEVER BEEN CAPPED?
The size of the Electoral College is tied directly to the size of Congress. Every state receives one elector for each House member plus two for its senators. What would presidential elections look like if the House had continued growing with population instead of remaining fixed at 435 seats?
THE UNCAPPED ELECTORAL MAP
Each state is assigned a hypothetical House delegation using the population count in force for that presidential election. Its electoral vote equals that delegation plus two senators. Hover over a state to see its hypothetical representation.
STATE-BY-STATE
See how representation and Electoral College weight change in each state when the House is allowed to grow with population.
| STATE | CENSUS POPULATION | HOUSE SEATS | ELECTORAL VOTES | WINNER |
|---|
HOW IT WORKS
The model holds representation near the 1920 national average of one House member for every 241,864 people. The total House size for each census is calculated by dividing the national apportionment population by that ratio.
Seats are then distributed among the states using the Method of Equal Proportions, with every state guaranteed at least one representative. This is the modern method used for congressional apportionment.
The 2000 presidential election uses the 1990 Census apportionment because those congressional delegations were still in force on Election Day. The 2004 and 2008 elections use Census 2000; 2012 through 2020 use the 2010 Census; and 2024 uses the 2020 Census.
Each state's electoral vote is its hypothetical House delegation plus two senators. Washington, D.C. remains at three electoral votes under the Twenty-third Amendment.
This is a counterfactual model. It assumes the statewide presidential vote remains unchanged. In reality, a much larger House could also affect parties, campaigns, turnout, district boundaries, candidate strategy and voter behavior.
SOURCES + METHODOLOGY
Population data: U.S. Census Bureau apportionment populations from the 1990, 2000, 2010 and 2020 decennial censuses.
Historical representation benchmark: U.S. Census Bureau historical apportionment data. The national 1920 average was approximately 241,864 people per House seat.
Presidential statewide winners: official federal presidential election results.
This visualization is a historical counterfactual and does not claim that voting behavior would necessarily have remained unchanged under a larger House.
Paid for by Project No Cap. Not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee.