Majority Rules?

Americans are famous for our dedication to fair play, and when the playing field gets tilted so that fairness is no longer a match for cleverness, we have a history of changing the rules to once again level the playing field. That time is upon us once again; we should devote ourselves to restoring majority rules in the elections of our presidents, and in the workings of the Senate.

Author and radio host Terrence McNally writes, “Republicans have won the national popular vote only once since 1988. Yet they have held the presidency nearly 12 of those years. As a result, they dominate the Supreme Court, and they hold 50 Senate seats though they’ve received several million fewer votes than Democrats in Senate elections. Today's minority rule opposes, delays, and disables our best efforts to confront the multiple existential crises we face.”

To be perfectly clear about the Founders’ intent, look no further than Thomas Jefferson, who said, "It is my principle that the will of the majority should always prevail."

It’s important to note that the filibuster is not a Constitutional construct. Rather, it is a Senate rule that allows the minority to obstruct majority rule. The filibuster isn’t in the Constitution because the concept of requiring a supermajority stymied progress as framers tried to build our rules for the road. Alexander Hamilton wrote in Federalist 22, “What at first sight may seem a remedy, is, in reality, a poison.”

Essayist and former Sierra Club CEO, CarlPope, writes that the filibuster is a “playbook stretching back to John C. Calhoun, who as vice president in 1841 forged the filibuster into a conscious instrument to block majoritarian democracy as part of his project of creating a durable framework for slavery in a nation he knew would eventually vote against it.” Pope continues, “Calhoun, generations of Southern senators, and now [Senate Minority Leader Mitch] McConnell have shared a determination that majority votes should not be the last word in the United States.”

Political consultant David Plouffe adds, “The argument that preserving the filibuster is necessary because it’s an important tool in our democracy falls apart when it’s clearer with every passing day we won’t have a democracy without Congress passing voting rights legislation.”

With the help of partisan gerrymandering, Republicans have maneuvered themselves into becoming a ruling minority in over half of the state legislatures, and in the United States Congress until they lost the majority in 2018.

Just as we’ve done on countless occasions from the American Revolution forward, we must once again put country over party, because for some time now, cynical pols have put party over country and the result has been partisan deadlock as we drive on dangerously decrepit roads and bridges, and have been lapped by a world whose infrastructure is more modern than ours, leaving us at a competitive disadvantage. A country that can’t even maintain its roadways due to partisan hackery needs a nonpartisan (not even bipartisan) reset. That reset has passed the House as the For the People Act, but languishes in the Senate.

The Koch Brothers, billionaire libertarians, spend millions every election cycle on conservative candidates, but they’d much prefer you not know that fact. In a leaked presentation to big donors, the research director for their political funding organization Stand Together, Kyle McKenzie, was barely able to contain his distress when he told participants that conservatives favor the anti-dark money provisions in the For the People Act nearly as much as liberals.

Research revealed that no amount of PR was going to sway the public, so, according to the New Yorker, “A senior Koch operative said that opponents would be better off ignoring the will of American voters and trying to kill the bill in Congress” using parliamentarian tactics like the filibuster which now allows a single senator to stop any legislation with nothing more than a text. If you were thinking of a “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” moment, think again.

The majority also speaks loud and clear on common sense gun safety. A recent Politico/Morning Consult poll found that 85% of registered voters support background checks on all gun sales, including 79% for background checks on gun show and other private sales; 64% support a ban on assault rifles. Yet you’d be mistaken to think an 85% majority gets its way.

It’s all of a piece, really. Don’t like election results? Ignore them and proffer the Big Lie that the election was stolen. Don’t like the proposed bill, whatever it may be? Ignore the majority and filibuster.

It may have been the Founders' intent for the Senate to be a cooling chamber allowing passions from the House to settle before legislation is approved, but because of the filibuster, it has proved to be quicksand.