On The Effects Of Direct Election of Senators

A few months ago, I accidentally happened onto this topic in a discussion with a friend of mine. I was reflecting on why it seems the norm that US Senators are, for the most part, inactive windbags. They rarely are capable of solo actions, but spend a lot of time talking, per the chamber's rather fusty old rules.

The other day, I finally remembered that I wanted to research how and why Senators became directly elected. And precisely how they were indirectly elected prior to the 17th amendment.

If you go to this page on the Senate website, you can read about how Senators were originally elected, per the Founding Fathers' intentions.

As the page notes,

"They decided that state legislatures should select senators, without any involvement by the House of Representatives. The state legislatures, they argued, would provide the necessary "filtration" to produce better senators—the elect of the elected. The framers hoped that this arrangement would give state political leaders a sense of participation, calming their fears about the dangers of a strong centralized government. The advantage of this plan, they believed, was that all laws would be passed by a "dual constituency" composed of a body elected directly by the people (or at least the white males entitled to vote) and one chosen by the elected legislators of individual states.

After several decades, as service in the Senate became more highly prized and political parties gained wider influence in directing state legislative operations, this system of indirect election began to break down. When separate parties controlled a legislature's two houses, deadlocks frequently deprived states of their full Senate representation.

A plan for direct popular election lingered for decades. Finally, a campaign to make governmental institutions more responsive to the people propelled the measure to ratification in 1913 as the Constitution's Seventeenth Amendment. "

Just reflecting on the original mechanism for Senate election, it's easy to see how differently Senators prior to 1913 would behave, as opposed to modern Senators. Senators chosen by their state's political party leaders would almost of necessity be committed to the welfare of their state over their own career. Because they didn't really 'run' for the office, fund-raising, politicking as it is currently understood, and the appeal to voters' baser motivations probably didn't occur as they do today.

I can imagine Senators of that day truly behaving as the Constitution's architects intended, worrying less about their seat than carefully addressing major issues to the benefit of the country and their state.

For another opinion on the direct election via the 17th Amendment you can read this webpage,
from which this passage is taken,

"The Seventeenth Amendment has dramatically reshaped the structure of the Senate.... The indirect election of Senators under the original constitution was designed to give Senators a degree of quality and independence from politics that is absent today.... to my mind this increased politicization of the Senate tends to make the Senate less, rather than more, equipped to responsibly and competently carry out the advice and consent powers given to it under the Constitution.

I think it is an open question as to whether the Framers would have entrusted the advice and consent power to the Senate in the same manner had they known that eventually Senators would be elected directly by the people in partisan elections, and as a result, the nature and tenor of the confirmation process would deviate so dramatically from what was originally anticipated.

I would say the same thing about Senate trial on Impeachment. When the Framers entrusted to the Senate the power to conduct trials regarding impeachment, they anticipated that the indirect election of Senators by state legislatures would tend to elevate to the Senate individuals largely independent of political pressures and selected based on their distinction, rather than politics. One can see how with that anticipation the Framers could imagine the Senate sitting as a sort of jury weighing the evidence on the impeachment of a public official.... The performance of the Senate during the Clinton impeachment showed the way in which impeachment is now an extension of politics, rather than the Senate sitting as a sort of sober jury, relatively independent of political pressures."


I agree with this writer. Three of this year's Presidential contenders, Obama, Hillary and Edwards, would probably never have even become Senators under the indirect election process. Much of today's partisan bitterness, which seems to have begun to gain ground in the 1970s, would probably be absent.

It may sound odd, but I believe we'd be taking a big step forward if we repealed the 17th amendment and returned to party appointment/election, via the state legislatures, of US Senators.