Protecting The Minority: New Ideas on Congressional Legislative Rules

The prospect of a Democratic majority and president adding healthcare to the legislation it has rammed through without any significant Republican involvement or agreement- stimulus and budget bills- brought me to consider how this could be remedied.

The Constitution is largely silent on margins for passage of legislation. This website provides the following information,

"Note 41. The U. S. Constitution requires a two-thirds vote of both Houses to pass a resolution proposing an amendment to the Constitution, to pass a vetoed bill, or to remove political disabilities; a two-thirds vote of either House to expel a member; and a vote of two-thirds of the Senators present to ratify a treaty or convict on an impeachment. The House requires a two-thirds vote to suspend the rules, but is obliged to allow a majority to order the previous question or to limit debate, as otherwise its business could never be transacted. Still, a bill cannot be passed without at least forty minutes of debate, as that is allowed after the suspension of the rules or the previous question has been ordered."

The preceding text involving Roberts' Rules of Order refers to majorities as a compromise between the will of the assembly and the rights of the individual.

Perhaps this is what we need in the Constitution. Provisions for legislation over a certain dollar amount, or length of bill requiring a 3/4 majority to pass.

It would be senseless to require some sort of multi-party involvement, because that allows small parties to hold the country hostage via Congress, much like the Greens did in Germany in the last decade. And we can't know how many, or few parties may exist in the future of our Republic.

Rather, in our era of mass, ubiquitous and instant communications, voters know very quickly whether one party stiff-armed the other, as the Democrats have done this year, or invited serious bi-partisan involvement in crafting legislation that significant numbers of both parties will support.

Today, the Democrats hold just shy of 60% of the House seats and 60-61 Senate seats. Yet numerous polls show voters do not agree with many of the actions taken legislatively by what has been essentially just the party currently in power.

Perhaps an amended Constitution should require 3/4 majority, thus forcing compromises, or no action whatsoever.

In time, voters will either keep party majorities below the required threshhold for legislative passage, in order to avoid the sort of behavior we've seen this year by Democrats in Congress and the White House, give one party the majority to ram its approach through, or elect different Representatives in no particular proportion, in order to shake up the dynamics in Congress.

What's clear, though, from this year, is that some better, stronger protection is required from surprisingly small party majorities forcing party-line legislative votes and ignoring any representation of minority views.