Editing State senator

{{Short description|Member of an upper house of a U.S. state legislature}}
{{about|the U.S. elected office|the Brazilian elected office|State Senator (Brazil)}}
{{refimprove|date=October 2013}}
A '''state senator''' is a member of a [[State legislature (United States)|state's senate]] in the [[bicameral]] legislature of 49 [[U.S. state]]s, or a member of the [[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.<ref>''[[Gray v. Sanders]]'', 372 U.S. 368 (1963)</ref>  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 1964, when the [[Supreme Court of the United States]] announced in ''[[Reynolds v. Sims]]'' that [[State legislature (United States)|state legislatures]] must apportion seats in both houses according to population.<ref>''[[Reynolds v. Sims]]'', 377 U.S. 533 (1964)</ref> However, the single-member district system remained, and as a result, the state senates became redundant bodies,<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.pressenterprise.com/2011/12/17/california-do-we-need-state-senators/|title=CALIFORNIA: Do we need state senators?|date=2011-12-17|work=Press Enterprise|access-date=2018-05-04|language=en-US}}</ref> 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==
{{Reflist}}

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[[Category:State senators of the United States| ]]