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Every election cycle, as the national narrative swirls ceaselessly around federal races, I think about a ceramic bowl in Richmond, Virginia.

In 2017, the first big electoral test of Trump’s first term, Democrats flipped 15 seats in Virginia’s House of Delegates, and control of the chamber came down to a single district. When Democrat Shelly Simonds’ race was certified a tie, election officials dropped two film canisters into a bowl and drew out her Republican opponent’s name. Just like that, the GOP kept the chamber, 51-49.

Two years later, Simonds won her rematch, and Democrats took full control of Virginia’s government for the first time in more than 20 years. In their first legislative session with the majority in both chambers, Democrats ratified the Equal Rights Amendment, enacted tighter gun control, expanded voting access, banned discrimination against LGBTQ Virginians, and rolled back abortion restrictions. A year later, Virginia became the first Southern state to abolish the death penalty. A draw from a bowl had delayed all of it by two years.

The stakes in statehouses have only grown since. 

With a revanchist Supreme Court stripping away federal rights and Congress limping through one of its least productive sessions in 40 years, Washington has all but stopped governing, and states have stepped into the breach. But while power has moved downstream, our attention largely hasn’t. The most consequential races on your ballot next week may be the ones you’re most tempted to skip. 

With more than 6,000 state legislative races on the ballot, there’s cautious optimism in the air. It’s well placed, but not foretold. History favors the party out of the White House in midterms, but history only tilts the odds. State legislative chambers are won in a small number of districts, by a small........

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