red man sue for heep'm patent infringement on bicameral legislature

t byfield tbyfield at panix.com
Sun May 23 10:11:25 PDT 1999



> kelley wrote:
>
> >so there's some inherent problem with two senators (6 yrs) balanced by reps
> >according to population in the house of congress? how's that? if i'm not
> >mistaken i think the brits first ripped off the idea of bicameral
> >legislature from the Iroquois Confederacy.

indeed. prior to the brits' encounter with the iroquois, the idea of 'two' was unknown in the west--*nay*--in all of indo- european political structure. it's quite remarkable but true: zero was invented a few hundred years before two. occasional- ly, scholars have had the temerity to claim that the normans knew of two but invaded england only after they were certain that they had consigned it to the dustbin of history, but as georges dumezil has irrefutably proven thati s absurd. there exists no historical condition prior to the brits' encounter with the iroquois that would have encouraged the notion of a bicameral legislature--not anywhere, not ever.

cheers, t



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