Description
A state senator is a member of an upper house in the bicameral State legislature (United States), legislatures of 49 U.S. states or a member of the Unicameralism, unicameral Nebraska Legislature.History
There are typically fewer state senators than there are members of a state's lower house; a senator's job is to represent the people at a higher level than a state representative in the lower house. In the past, this meant that senators represented various geographic regions within a state, regardless of the population, as a way of balancing the power of the lower house, which was apportioned according to population. This system changed in 1963, when the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that State legislature (United States), state legislatures must apportion seats in both houses according to population. However, the single-member district system remained, and as a result, the State Senates became redundant bodies, as other solutions, such as abolition (as in Legislative assemblies of Canadian provinces and territories, Canada) or switching to statewide proportional representation (as in Parliaments of the Australian states and territories, Australia) have not been adopted.References
{{US-poli-stub State senators of the United States,