[telotortium]

Modeling themselves after the US Congress, itself modeled after the British Parliament (House of Commons and House of Lords).

I personally believe bicameral legislatures - allowing houses to deadlock on a bill - are a terrible idea. Either unicameral (used by one US State, Nebraska) or tricameral legislatures, with 2 out of 3 houses needing to approve a bill for it to pass, make much more sense.

[giantg2]

I think some state legislatures actually predated to federal one. I know some states had constitutions before the US did, but I don't know if they included the legislature structure.

Why only one house or three? What exactly would that fix? Sure you eliminate most deadlock, but how does that representation? Also, is deadlock really a bad thing in all scenarios?

[FateOfNations]

It all goes back to the English parliament with it's two houses, either directly modeled after that, or via the Federal government congress.

[jeffbee]

That only begins to make sense if it's actually modeled on the US Congress, with proportional representation in one chamber and specific representation of subdivisions in the other, but to have two chambers both with proportional representation, as California has, makes no sense.

[bdamm]

Canada is effectively unicameral. Random data point.