How unworkable would the U.S. state and federal governments be?
Handwave the reasoning behind the hypothetical. America is now composed of hundreds of tiny states. Some of the arid western ones having a ridiculously low population, but still have to elect a state government and fund state projects and systems. Could it have worked? Would the whole thing just flounder under the weight of all those unnecessary expenditures? What of the rat’s nest of state’s rights, re: abortion, gun control, drug legalization, speed limits, et al?
Bigger Senate, same sized House approximately, lots of land still in territories. Slavery abolished without a war (maybe). Bigger federal government to deal with the sheer number of states.
Or we could have just forgotten about counties, so that each state was effectively one county; given the areas of the U.S. and Vermont, we’d have about 400 states; for comparison, there are currently about 3,100 (Wikipedia seems to say anywhere from 3,033 to 3,143) counties, and they each have a government of sorts. Although it seems silly to make some large unpopulated areas, like Alaska, multiple small states (Texas currently has a county with a population of just 82).
Each of those states would have two (2) Senators, giving them all equal weight in the Senate. As intentionally designed by the Founders, that gives the “small” states equal pull with the “big” states. So all those low-population sagebrush states would have influence far beyond the “big” states in proportion to their population, in the Senate.
Now, isn’t the Senate the place were all appropriations bills must originate? (Somebody, tell me if I’m remembering my American Government lessons correctly here.) So we might see lots of freeways and bridges to nowhere out among the saguaro cactuses.
ETA: With a bit of Googling, now I’m not so sure. The House originates all tax and revenue bills. But who originates all spending bills? House or Senate?