Making law in secret by "unanimous consent"

[unixronin]

U.S. Senator Jim DeMint (R-South Carolina) voices concerns that the Senate passes over 90% of legislation without any debate, without amendment, and without a roll call vote.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again.  If you think your bill needs to be passed unread and without amendments or a recorded vote, then I suggest that on the contrary, it almost certainly means it should not be passed at all.  Because if your bill is a benefit to the nation, then why do you need to hide it from the nation until it's a fait accompli and conceal who voted to pass it?

Comments

[randwolf.livejournal.com]

What DeMint is complaining about is how the Senate has done business from the beginning of the Republic. He was fine with it when it was his party in charge, running up a huge war debt. He was one of the war's boosters, and even voted against laws that might have prevented some of the worst war profiteering.

The Republicans, despite their talk, are not libertarian.

So far as I can tell, the customs of the Senate were designed to protect the power of elites: bankers and businessmen in the North and slaveholders in the South. The slaveholders lost out to the bankers and businessmen, and now they maintain their hold, though it slips in periods of war (when the government dominates the economy) and occasional short periods of liberalization: 1932-1939 and 1960-1975.

If it were up to me, I would simply abolish the Senate as an institution no longer of value, nor appropriate to a free people, but it is not that simple. It is hard to make any major change in institutions, simply because people rightly suspect fundamental changes, even potentially positive ones. There are also a lot of people who don't want democracy: people who identify with the elites or people who did well in the system until the recent collapse and hope to do well again.

[lebo-superman.livejournal.com]

There are also a lot of people who don't want democracy: people who identify with the elites or people who did well in the system until the recent collapse and hope to do well again.

It has been quite a while since I was in my high school civics class, but it seems that I remember learning that this was never meant to be a democracy. It was meant to be (if memory serves) a Representative Republic. Those of us who value liberty and individual freedom need to stop calling this a democracy if we have any hope of ever reasserting those liberties and freedoms our Founding Fathers gave us.

[randwolf.livejournal.com]

Madison used the term "republic," by which he meant a government where the will of the people is expressed via elected representatives. The terms have run together over time in common usage, though, and saying "republic" without qualification creates confusion, so I prefer "democracy;" the technical distinction of Madison's time seems to me no longer of much value.

It remains the case that the Senate is, as it has been since the foundation of the republic of the USA, representative not of the people as a whole, but rather of the will of wealthy and powerful elites.

[ithildae.livejournal.com]

The senate was DESIGNED to be less beholden to the populace than either the house, or the president. That is why they had six year terms of office. Who the Senators were actually beholden to was the business of the people electing them in the first place. Money has always been an issue.

The traditions in the Senate are different from the ones in the House. For one thing, there is more collegiality. The whole process is designed to foster "gridlock" in times when partisan tensions are high or populist demagoguery are in style. The goal is not to "get things done" but to do the least amount of harm. Personally, I like that in a government. Even if it means that some of my pet projects are delayed. (Or an opposing party is in power.)

[randwolf.livejournal.com]

I agree that the Senate was designed as you say. Not just to protect money, though: it protected the class system of the early USA. The Senate early became the ground where the South defended slavery, and then segregation. It is now the place where the support of torture and the opposition to habeas corpus runs highest. It is the more populist House which is usually the less crazy, though perhaps that would change were the Senate gone. The Senate deadlocks during the quiet times; the times when tension runs high: war, the end of war, or economic chaos are the only times it moves and then usually in a panic. I am reminded of George F. Kennan's description of how the USA makes foreign policy: like some prehistoric monster which, when you kick its tail, bellows and charges two minutes later!

[ithildae.livejournal.com]

And I maintain that those descriptions are a feature, not a bug, of our American Republic. They are designed to preserve the Republic, do it does not become a Democracy, which is far too easily subverted. (As events in the world over the past 25 years have amply demonstrated. Take Russia as exhibit A)

[randwolf.livejournal.com]

It the Senate preserving the republic or is it just stubborn? Whenever a bad situation arises or a policy fails the Senate is there to prolong the problem until it becomes a crisis.

What do you see the relevance of either the USSR or Russia here?

[ithildae.livejournal.com]

Russia is an experiment in more direct democracy. The democracy has been corrupted, and a small group effectively hold power over the entire nation. I don't want that kind of democracy. The two houses in our congress tend to prevent that kind of take over. It is still possible, but harder.

All-in-all, I prefer the brakes the Senate provides to most change to the alternative possibilities. We could lose our freedoms while we watched, with nothing we could do about it, if the Senate were more responsive and compliant.

[randwolf.livejournal.com]

We lost many freedoms in "the big zero (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/28/opinion/28krugman.html)," and the Senate has participated. Watching the Senate's interaction with the financial and health insurance industry, it is clear that a small group dominates the Senate--or rather that a majority Senators represent various elite factions. Reading history, it appears this has been the case from the from the inception of the US republic. I will admit that I don't know that a unicameral legislature would have fared better, but I doubt it would have done worse.

My impression of Russia was that she made huge mistakes in the economic reforms of the 1980s and the rest followed. How do you see a different legislative model as preventing this? Come to that, the USA made similar mistakes in the same period--Russia was following the same theories that the US was using. Um. Now, that's interesting...

[polaris93.livejournal.com]

I completely agree. So where are our congressional watchdogs when we really need them, dammit?! Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quis_custodiet_ipsos_custodes%3F), anyway?