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What, exactly, is the purpose of Congress? During another presidency of Donald Trump, it can be hard to tell. The authority to declare war, traditionally viewed as a vital legislative power, has become a murky prerogative of the executive branch in the time since September 11; Trump, in recent months, has asserted even more of that control for himself, conducting military actions on boats in the Caribbean.

The authority over spending seems to have mostly been taken away from the legislative branch as well; currently, under the office of budget chief, Russell Vought, much of the ability to appropriate government money has also defaulted to the executive, with the White House claiming the authority to cancel congressionally authorized spending and attempting to move the money to other uses. It’s as if they’re enacting any legislation, either; almost all bills must currently be packed into spending packages, huge recurring essential omnibus legislation that can bypass the senate obstruction. But when those don’t pass – and more and more, they do not – the federal government just ceases operations. At least, large sections of the government do – and it’s not clear how many citizens are aware. At present, the federal government has been shut down all month; there are little indication of it resuming operations anytime soon. But the executive branch continues operating smoothly.

And so the question of dominance of the House and Senate can appear rather irrelevant. Why should U.S. citizens be concerned who holds a controlling share in a institution that has mostly abolished itself?

In what way ‘oppose the president’ messaging could help California’s Prop 50 succeed

And yet Proposition 50, California’s ballot measure on district boundaries that could deliver five more congressional positions to the Democrats if it is embraced by the electorate in a special election in the coming weeks, has captured the political imagination of liberals nationwide. Partly, it is a belated reaction to developments happening in other states: Republican-controlled states have for a long time adopted dramatic partisan gerrymandering while large blue states such as the Golden State, New York and Washington draw their maps via impartial independent commissions, an asymmetry that has led to closely divided control of the House and a long-term feeling, by Democrats, that their party is bringing a knife to a gun fight. The California proposal is explicitly intended as a countermove to a mid-decade redrawing of maps that was recently approved in the Lone Star State, which implemented boundaries that will give Republicans an five more seats in the state’s congressional delegation in the upcoming term; comparable redistricting moves are in progress in states such as Missouri and Indiana. (Democrats in Virginia are likewise emulating California’s example in attempting to alter districts.)

The state measure seems likely to be approved, as progressive electorate react with fear and anger to the president’s autocratic centralization of authority and look for methods to restrain his most extreme tendencies. But Prop 50 is not without debate. Some opponents warn that the move could have unintended consequences, with Democratic-controlled states’ attempts to change districts triggering a retaliatory cycle in which Republican-controlled states do additional to draw their maps so as to eliminate any chance of Democratic competitiveness. Different critics have questioned the measure on strictly principled pro-democracy bases: a district that is drawn in such a way that the result of the election is never really in question, they say, is one that cannot be said to be truly representative: it implies, necessarily, that the power of dissenting voices is muted, and that the process of debate, argument and convincing that is meant to characterize a healthy political system will be confined only to party primaries, if it occurs at all.

It is worth considering each of these criticisms on their own terms. The initial critique, that the measure will provoke the right to redraw their own maps in retaliation, fails as a causal argument: it does not make sense to claim that Republicans will be compelled to act in undemocratic ways by Democrats’ actions when they are already doing so without those steps. The Republican party, it can be noted, has not needed any incentive of retaliation to redraw maps that secure long-term positions for themselves: they have been willing to do this for its own sake, in the complete lack of similar actions by the left, for a long time.

The second objection, I think, is more substantive, reflecting not just a tactical difference about how to confront the GOP’s anti-democracy shift, but a kind of melancholic wish for a distinct nation than the one that the United States has turned into. It is accurate that in a more ideal situation – in the world that the majority of Democrats, I think, yearn for and aspire to – the proposition would be distasteful to our principles, and not required by our situation. It is not good to manipulate targeted population groups; it is harmful for politicians to choose their constituents, rather than the reverse; it is negative that elections are made uncontested. That these measures have become essential in order to impede the authoritarian advance of Trump’s power and lessen the amount of harm he is capable to inflict is unfortunate; it is a sign of how far we have fallen from a state more like a representative government. But they are required. It is only once the fight against the current administration’s ideology has been won that we can mourn what opposing it has made us.

If the legislative branch fails to in practice have lawmaking, war making or budgetary authority, what is it, precisely, that Prop 50’s additional five Democratic house members will be dispatched to Washington to do? One aspect that the House and Senate continues to holds is subpoena power, and the power to investigate. Even in our time of stagnant politics and congressional atrophy, it has utilized of that authority to significant impact. In the coming years, if Prop 50 is approved and California’s additional Democrats are take office, they will become a part of a body with the power to probe the president, to broadcast their investigations into his actions and to force members of his inner circle to give evidence. It’s significant, and more importantly, it’s not anything that any conservative would do.

• The columnist is a news outlet columnist