On this day (October 2) in 1789, President George Washington sent copies of 12 newly-proposed constitutional amendments to the legislatures of the States for their ratification. (The Congress had approved these first 12 amendments on September 28, 1789.) Only the last ten of these amendments, however, which are now known as the “Bill of Rights”, were ratified by the requisite number of States. One of the two unratified amendments is reprinted below:

“After the first enumeration required by the first article of the Constitution, there shall be one Representative for every thirty thousand, until the number shall amount to one hundred, after which the proportion shall be so regulated by Congress, that there shall be not less than one hundred Representatives, nor less than one Representative for every forty thousand persons, until the number of Representatives shall amount to two hundred; after which the proportion shall be so regulated by Congress, that there shall not be less than two hundred Representatives, nor more than one Representative for every fifty thousand persons.“

Had this amendment been ratified, we could have had more than 6,000 representatives today, compared to the 435 we currently have! (More details about this unratified amendment are available here.)