January 21, 2022
When Republicans take back the House and Senate, hopefully in 2022, and the White House, hopefully in 2024, I believe one thing they should consider:
Propose a constitutional amendment to make the Senate supermajority for passing bills part of the constitution.
But a constitutional amendment requires a supermajority in Congress and the states to pass, you might point out. It would need a lot of support from Democrats as well as Republicans.
It might be able to get that support, though. Currently the supermajority requirement is in the odd situation that it could actually be rescinded by a simple majority in the Senate. It hasn't been so far simply because there is a certain degree of sentiment that it is a longstanding tradition that should not be tampered with. That is why Manchin and Sinema have refused to agree to it. The rationale for the supermajority is that it puts the brakes on the rash passage of legislation. It makes the Senate the less impulsive organ of the legislative branch that is harder to get legislation passed in.
Why might Democrats support the amendment? Because when Republicans are in power they would be in a position to abolish the supermajority requirement. They might do so and pass something the Democrats hated, like for example a national ban on abortion.
So the constitutional amendment would be a way for the Republicans, when they have full control in Washington, to say: Democrats, we're willing to tie our own hands by a constitutional amendment, and what we get in return is that your hands will likewise be tied when you're in power.
It would be a fair deal, and it might win enough of a national consensus to pass the tough obstacles involved in amending the constitution. Polls show the public strongly supports the current policy, so it stands to reason that they would support making it more-or-less permanent by putting it into the constitution. (nothing is completely permanent in the constitution, at least in principle, since an amendment could be rescinded by a future amendment, but it would have the same tough hurdles for that to happen)
Thinking outside the box. Opinions?
Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at
12:57 PM
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Post contains 368 words, total size 2 kb.
Posted by: Dana Mathewson at January 21, 2022 10:41 PM (Ys0s/)
Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at January 22, 2022 10:45 AM (tKFGp)
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