One of the oddities of the Australian Washminster system is that constitutional innovation is non-existent. I think this is to do with constitutions being seen as legislative and under the purview of the purview of the House/Assembly. It is no more special than any other piece of legislation and as such is largely impermanent. Only the Australian national constitution is entrenched as above the legislative. In NSW parts require popular ratification but the rest can be changed by a majority in the legislature. Several Australian states still do not have formal constitutions.

In America by contrast, the constitutional system is highly innovative, however, unlike Australia which has all sorts of innovation around voting and the ballot box, the US is practically neolithic in its electoral technologies. Yglesias writes:

The way the current Voting Rights Act stands, it seems likely that states wouldn't be allowed to do that. It would, however, be relatively easy to fix the legislative language in order to make multi-member districts a way for states to meet their VRA requirements. Whether state legislatures would actually take advantage of that opportunity, I couldn't say, but I think it would be a big improvement to the American political system for a variety of reasons of which handling the minority representation issue better is just one.

Given the number of US states it is a surprise that so many are so conservative in how they choose representatives. Nearly all the Australian states, and the Australian Senate have forms of proportional voting or preference voting and multi-member districts. Tasmania is probably one of the most innovative with the Robson Rotation.

I wish Australia would pick up on the constitutional innovation in the United States, while conversely, I wish the US would pick up on the electoral innovation in Australia.

More Reading on Constitution

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• Balancing Legislative and Executive Representation
• an imaginary constitution for Australia
• Copernican paradigm
• The Strength of The Republican Cause
• Australian Federal Referendums
• Categorising the Australian Referendums
• Balancing Stability and Fluidity