The Alabama paradox
- The Alabama paradox was the first of the apportionment paradoxes to be discovered. The US House of Representatives is constitutionally required to allocate seats based on population counts, which are required every 10 years. The size of the House is set by statute.
- After the 1880 census, C. W. Seaton, chief clerk of the United States Census Bureau, computed apportionments for all House sizes between 275 and 350, and discovered that Alabama would get eight seats with a House size of 299 but only seven with a House size of 300.