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What, precisely, is the purpose of Congress? In the second Trump administration, it can be hard to tell. The power to initiate armed conflict, traditionally viewed as a crucial legislative power, has turned into a unclear right of the presidential office in the years since September 11; Trump, in recent months, has claimed even more of that control for himself, authorizing military actions on vessels in the Caribbean.

The authority over spending seems to have largely been stripped from Congress as well; now, under the leadership of budget chief, the OMB director, much of the power to allocate federal funds has likewise defaulted to the presidency, with the administration asserting the authority to cancel legislatively approved spending and seeking to redirect the funds to other uses. It’s as if they’re passing any laws, either; almost all legislation must now be packed into spending packages, massive recurring must-spend comprehensive bills that can bypass the senate obstruction. But when these don’t pass – and more and more, they don’t – the federal government just shuts down. At least, large sections of the administration do – and it’s not clear how many people are aware. Currently, the government has been closed all month; there are little indication of it reopening anytime soon. But the executive branch continues operating smoothly.

And so the question of dominance of Congress can appear somewhat moot. Why should Americans care who has a controlling share in a institution that has largely rendered itself powerless?

In what way ‘oppose the president’ messaging could assist the state of California’s Proposition 50 prevail

And yet Prop 50, California’s redistricting referendum that could deliver five more congressional positions to the Democratic Party if it is approved by the electorate in a special election in the coming weeks, has captured the political imagination of liberals nationwide. Partly, it is a belated reaction to developments occurring elsewhere: GOP-led states have for a long time adopted extreme biased redistricting while large blue states such as California, New York and Washington draw their district lines via nonpartisan independent commissions, an imbalance that has resulted in narrowly split control of the House and a long-term sense, by Democrats, that their party is at a disadvantage. The state measure is clearly designed as a countermove to a mid-decade redrawing of maps that was recently approved in Texas, which implemented maps that will provide Republicans an five more seats in the state’s congressional delegation in the upcoming term; similar boundary changes are in progress in states such as Missouri and Indiana. (Democrats in the Old Dominion are also emulating the state’s example in seeking to redistrict.)

The California initiative seems probable to be approved, as progressive electorate react with fear and anger to the president’s autocratic consolidation of power and seek methods to restrain his worst tendencies. But Prop 50 is not without controversy. Some critics caution that the action could backfire, with Democratic-controlled states’ attempts to redistrict setting off a revenge pattern in which Republican-controlled states do even more to draw their districts so as to foreclose any chance of opposition party success. Different critics have critiqued the proposal on more purely ideological pro-democracy grounds: a district that is drawn in such a manner that the outcome of the vote is never really in doubt, they say, is one that cannot be said to be genuinely representative: it means, inevitably, that the power of opposing voices is muted, and that the process of deliberation, discussion and convincing that is meant to characterize a functioning political system will be limited only to primary elections, if it happens at all.

It is valuable taking each of these objections on their merits. The first critique, that the measure will spur conservatives to alter their respective districts in response, does not hold up as a causal argument: it is illogical to claim that Republicans will be made to behave in undemocratic ways by Democrats’ measures when they are already doing so in the absence of those steps. The Republican party, it can be noted, has required no any incentive of retaliation to redraw boundaries that secure permanent positions for their party: they have been willing to do this for their own benefit, in the complete lack of Democratic reciprocation, for a long time.

The other critique, I think, is more substantive, expressing not just a tactical difference about how to address the Republicans’ undemocratic turn, but a kind of melancholic desire for a different country than the one that the United States has turned into. It is accurate that in a more ideal situation – in the reality that the majority of Democrats, I think, desire and aspire to – the proposition would be distasteful to our principles, and not mandated by our circumstances. It is not good to pack and crack targeted population groups; it is not good for politicians to select their voters, instead of the reverse; it is negative that elections are rendered uncontested. That these measures have grown essential in order to impede the authoritarian creep of the president’s control and lessen the amount of suffering he is able to inflict is sad; it is a indication of how much we have fallen from something more like a democracy. But they are required. Only after the battle against the current administration’s ideology has been won that we can mourn what fighting it has made us.

If Congress fails to in reality have lawmaking, military or appropriations authority, what is it, precisely, that Prop 50’s five new Democratic representatives will be dispatched to the capital to do? One thing that Congress still holds is the authority to compel testimony, and the ability to investigate. Even in our time of stagnant politics and congressional atrophy, it has made use of that authority to great effect. In the coming years, if the measure is approved and the state’s additional representatives are sworn in, they will become a part of a body with the power to probe Trump, to broadcast their investigations into his actions and to force members of his inner circle to give evidence. It’s significant, and more importantly, it’s not something that any conservative would do.

• Moira Donegan is a Guardian US columnist