Apportionment Act

The Apportionment Act was a proposed United States federal law that would have fixed the size of the United States House of Representatives based on the United States Census of 1790. The bill was vetoed by President George Washington on 5 April 1792 as unconstitutional, marking the first use of the U.S. President's veto power. Washington made two objections in a letter to the House describing the reason for his veto. The first objection made in the letter was that the bill did not have a uniform ratio to reach the numbers of representatives to population set forth in the bill. Secondly, the bill "allotted to eight of the States more than one for every thirty thousand" as delimited by Article I Section II of the United States Constitution. The next day, the House attempted to override the President's veto but failed to reach the two thirds vote required and on 10 April efforts began to revise the bill a third time.