America Has a Unicameral Legislature

by: Chris Bowers

Thu May 21, 2009 at 10:58


Does America have a unicameral legislature? Here is a thought experiment that suggests we do.

First, try to think of all the times you can remember when the U.S. Senate either significantly altered, or blocked entirely, legislation passed by the U.S. House. Then, try to think of all the times when the U.S. House blocked or significantly altered legislation passed by the U.S. Senate.

As I discuss in the extended entry, the Senate has either blocked or significantly altered legislation passed by the House far more often than the House has blocked or significantly altered legislation passed by the Senate. The net result is that we have a unicameral legislature, when the Senate holds all the power and the House basically serves as Senate staffers.

More in the extended entry.

Chris Bowers :: America Has a Unicameral Legislature
On the first point, off-hand I can think of several times this year alone when the Senate has blocked or delayed House legislation. The Senate cut $108 billion from the stimulus package, entirely blocked the Employee Free Choice Act, housing bankruptcy reform (aka "cramdown"), bailout oversight and reform, and executive compensation limits. It is highly likely that the Senate will also water down, or block completely, the climate change bill currently moving through the House.

Even before this session of Congress, the Senate was still blocking legislation passed by the House and ready for a presidential signature. For example, back in December, the Senate also blocked auto bailout legislation that had passed though the House. It works to block conservative legislation, too. For example, in 2006, the Senate never took up the immigration bill passed by the House. Social Security privatization might have passed if not for the Senate.

On the second point, there are comparatively few instances when the House has blocked or significantly altered Senate legislation. Health care reconciliation is the most glaring instance, although that is a procedural change rather than a public policy change. Also, the House is currently holding up D.C. voting rights legislation, with no clear indication as to when they will take it up again (or even if it will be altered). Further, last year the delayed passage of the Wall Street bailout by four days, and made the Senate slightly change the bill before passing it.

While there are examples on both sides, overall the scale tilts heavily in one direction.  The Senate regularly blocks or significantly alters legislation that has been passed by the House, while the House rarely blocks and makes minor alterations to legislation passed by the Senate. While the House writes most of the legislation that is passed into law, that does not make it an equal in terms of legislative power. Rather, it renders the House an extension of Senate staff.

Functionally, we have a unicameral Congress with the House serving as staffing aides to the Senate. This means that we don't really have local representatives in Congress, only state representatives. It also means that we don't have much diversity at all in Congress, given that the Senate is 95% white, and 83% male.

Much of this has to do with the abuse of the 60 vote rule by Senate Republicans. Not only has this obstructionist mentality by Republicans either blocked and watered down much of the Democratic agenda, it has also rendered the House of Representatives virtually powerless. Maybe that is one reason why Senate Democrats haven't done more to stop the abuse of the 60-vote rule. It's like the old political joke:

Two House Democrats, one senior and one a freshman, talking strategy in the hallway. A senior House Republican walks by, and the freshman say, mostly joking, "Uh oh, careful, there goes the enemy!"

The senior Democrat immediately admonishes the tyro. "NO! No, now that's wrong. The Republicans are the opposition. The enemy...well, the enemy is the Senate."

Indeed.

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America Has a Unicameral Legislature | 26 comments
it looks that way now (4.00 / 1)
because Democrats control both chambers.

In late 2001/2002, some good bills got through the Democratic-controlled Senate but had no hope of getting to the floor in the Republican-controlled House.

Also, the House did a pretty good job of destroying/watering down the Waxman/Markey climate change bill without any help from the Senate.

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examples? (4.00 / 1)
what pased through the senate back then but was blocked by the house?
[ Parent ]
Here's one special case (4.00 / 1)
in 2007, the Senate had the votes to override Bush's veto over S-CHIP, whereas the override failed in the House. Sure, it was under the circumstances of a presidential veto, but here the Senate actually acted as the more moderate branch while the House Repubs voted more partisan and conservative.
[ Parent ]
Ah, very good (0.00 / 0)
Thanks for the example. Not quite sure it is works, because technically the White House blocked Senate legislation along with the House, rather than only the House blocking it. Still, a thoughtful example.
[ Parent ]
Abolish the Senate. (4.00 / 2)
The Senate is profoundly undemocratic.  The founders didn't want a democracy.  They created a system in which the most backward and conservative elements would always rule.  Combine the filibuster with the disproportionate representation of states with small populations, and the structure ensures that legislators representing about 20% of the population will control the entire system.  And people are somehow surprised and confused when they see that we live under the tyranny of that 20%.

It isn't the "abuse" of the filibuster that is the problem.  It is the very existence of the Senate.  

I think that's a misrepresentation (0.00 / 0)
The founders didn't want a pure democracy, fearing tyranny of the majority, but they did want democratic representation.  The composition of the Senate was intended to protect geographic minorities.  It was a necessary compromise.

The Senate makes sense if you believe that the several states are independent entities with a certain degree of sovereignty. Some would argue that the states are anachronistic entities that shouldn't mean as much these days, but if you believe in the rule of law, those states still have to explicitly cede power to the federal government if you wish to change or abolish the Senate.

Things You Don't Talk About in Polite Company: Religion, Politics, the Occasional Intersection of Both

[ Parent ]
Tyranny of the majority is (0.00 / 0)
one phrase that makes my skin crawl.  I realize you are just explaining what the founders claimed to believe.  I disagree that they (collectively) wanted a democracy: they wanted a conservative government that was broadly responsive to property owners.

I don't think there has been a government in human history that could remotely be claimed to be a "tyranny of the majority."  I don't think there's been a plebiscite democracy since Athens.  

The old wise men who fear the majority will point to mass movements to argue against mob rule - the French Revolution, or fascism - but these are just examples of people rising up in desperate times, not indications of the proper form of government.

I don't believe in the rule of law any more, or any less than anyone else.  I'm against violence.  But I have little respect for the Constitution. The Constitution isn't a document of any principle, and was inadequate when written, and more inadequate every year.  We'd be better off without it.

[ Parent ]
The founders believed in democracy (0.00 / 0)
But they believed in local democracy, along the lines of New England town hall meetings.  There was a belief in limited federal government.  It wasn't supposed to be what it is now, but then, the states weren't supposed to be as economically interconnected as they are now.

As for use of the term tyranny of the majority, I don't use it to suggest an actual tyranny.  It's meant metaphorically.  For example, imagine if there were no legal doctrine of incorporation arising from the 14th Amendment, which applies the Bill of Rights to the various states. The antebellum status quo permitted established religion for the states, but not the federal government.  There exist laws that would definitely be passed with strong popular support in some states which would some here would probably label "tyranny of the majority".

The bottom line is, if you truly had faith in democracy, a Bill of Rights wouldn't be necessary, but a constrained democracy is better than pure democracy.


Things You Don't Talk About in Polite Company: Religion, Politics, the Occasional Intersection of Both

[ Parent ]
A couple things (0.00 / 0)
First, the extent to which the founders "believed" in democracy is difficult to quantify, because there are too many shades of terminology, differences of opinion among the founders, and different historical interpretations.

Naturally, they envisioned that government would be conducted on the local level.  That was the reality of the times and the way in which the country was settled.  Nothing else was practical.  The question they primarily dealt with was how the colonial governments, which were created out of historical accident, would relate to a unifying federal government.  

To say if I truly had faith in democracy, a bill of rights wouldn't be necessary is wrong, for several reasons:

1.  I don't necessarily have faith in the outcomes of democracy.  I acknowledge as much as anyone that the majority of people aren't always wise.  In order for democracy to work, certain preconditions must be met, in terms of literacy and economic stability.  I think it may be true that capitalism is fundamentally at odds with democracy, so perhaps democracy just isn't possible without rebuilding not just the Constitution, but the economy from the ground up.  I do think the success of government should be measured by the welfare of the average person.  How we acheive that end is open to debate, and it is possible that a benevolent dictator can be a more effective than a representative democracy.  But if a government ISN'T democratic, it shouldn't get away with cloaking itself in the moral authority of democracy.  

2.  The protections of the bill of rights (which are respected in other countries without the encumbrance of a single written constitution) are not a limitation on democracy.  They are a limitation on the power of government.  The prinicples of individual rights determine whether the government can act.  The principle of democracy determines how it acts.  They are separate concepts.  

Why did the founders have such fear of a form of government that had never been tried?

[ Parent ]
not undemocratic. anti-democratic (4.00 / 1)
It's not just that we live under the tyranny of the 20% --- we live under the tyranny of those who fund the political careers of senators that allegedly represent that 20%.  Big Oil, Big Insurance, Big Pharama, Big Ag and Big Money period all know the math.  There's a bigger payoff backing and buying senators from small states like DE, VT, and NH, and sparsely populated Western ones like MT, WY, ID and AK.  Fund their political careers and you have a lock on the country.
We do not owe the anti-democratic tendencies of the founding fathers any automatic reverence.  They got some things (like freedom of the press and no established religion) right and others very, very wrong.  Some perspective is in order.  These folks would have made me chattel, and passed the Second Amendment to make sure there was a plentiful supply of armed free white men to staff the slave patrols. Like the Second Amendment, the institution of the US Senate has evolved all sorts of revisionist explanations for itself.  Just as its defenders free themselves from history whenever it becomes inconvenient, we should free ourselves from automatically genuflecting before the intent of the Consitution's authors.  If they meant the Senate to be an anti-democratic check against the will of the people, and it's not hard to make that case at all, then they were wrong.  The choice against democracy was not theirs to make for us, two centuries later.  It's ours to make.  We really do need to un-do the Senate, somehow, to get democracy.

That is how far from people's needs today reverence for the "original intent" of their constitution leads us.  

And they locked into place what has become an anti-democratic Senate, guarded by a SCOTUS that says no to taking the money out of politics, since the rule of money is the current equivalent of the divinely sanctioned rule of the nobility in previous centuries.  It's time to look for the tools to pick that lock.

"If you want that good feeling that comes from doing things for other people, then you have to pay for it in abuse and misunderstanding..."
Zora Neale Hurston

[ Parent ]
The Constitution was a pragmatic document (0.00 / 0)
Not only should we avoid worshiping the Founding Fathers, we should stop treating the Constitution itself as some grand statement of principle.  It's a pragmatic document that reflects a consensus on the working rules of this country.  Trying to make it more than that is silly.

Things You Don't Talk About in Polite Company: Religion, Politics, the Occasional Intersection of Both
[ Parent ]
Majority rule (0.00 / 0)
The House is even more democratic (with a small d) than it appears.  In the last fity years only once has the House chosen a "majority party" that has not gotten a majority of the cumulative poular vote from all 435 House races.  That was in 1996 when Democrats got 43,393,580 votes and Republicans got 43,120,872 votes but won 226 House seats.

Of course during the same timeone Presidential election (2000) also was "claimed" by the party with fewer votes.

The US House site lists votes back to 1920 but only gives national totals back to 1942.  That is the other documented case where a party won fewer popular votes but more House seats.  In that case, Republicans had a significant edge in the popular voteof over 1.2 million votes (14,203,275 to 12,934,691.  The explanation lies in the anemic vote totals in the 120 Southern Congressional districts.  The 13 Southern states cast 2,138,829 votes for the House with 89 of the 120 seats going unopposed.  The (then) 35 non-southern states cast 25,935,535 votes for 310 seats.  Only West Vorginia cast even as many as half of the votes from an avergae non-Southern district.

One major reason for low turnout was that blacks could not vote in many southern areas.  Many whites chose not to come out for uncontested or bearly contested races,

[ Parent ]
Good luck getting 3/4 of the states to approve THAT (0.00 / 0)
13 states can block a constitutional amendment.  Wyoming, Alaska, Rhode Island, Montana, Idaho, Vermont, New Hampshire already get you halfway there.  

And, anyway, the House is probably more antidemocratic these days with the absurd gerrymandered districts that protect incumbents.  At least the Senate is elected via at-large districts that can't be gamed and re-gamed every ten years.

[ Parent ]
Which is why I am increasingly of the opinion (0.00 / 0)
That if you want serious change, you need to start a movement to just get rid of the Constitution and start over from scratch.

Which is going to mean re-opening certain interpretations of Constitutional rights to democratic debate.

Things You Don't Talk About in Polite Company: Religion, Politics, the Occasional Intersection of Both

[ Parent ]
But... (0.00 / 0)
That would also probably mean saying goodbye to the first, fourth, fifth and sixth amendments. So, you know, there would be a SERIOUS downside.  
[ Parent ]
It would mean reformulating them (0.00 / 0)
At least some aspects.  I don't think it means saying goodbye.

I'm willing to open the debate, but I admit to being less risk-adverse than most people.  I also believe democracy means letting the people make bad decisions and legitimizing those choices.

Things You Don't Talk About in Polite Company: Religion, Politics, the Occasional Intersection of Both

[ Parent ]
Ooh, Nebraska (0.00 / 0)
Nebraska is the only state with a unicameral legislature.  It is pretty ironic that the most conservative Democrat who is set to "rule" in this crazy structure is Ben Nelson of Nebraska.  Nelson showed quite clearly in his tinkering with the stimulus package that he has poor judgement and crappy knowledge.  Susan Collins was not much different.
Do you also want to copy (0.00 / 0)
Their nonpartisan elections?

Things You Don't Talk About in Polite Company: Religion, Politics, the Occasional Intersection of Both
[ Parent ]
That's what Jesse Ventura says about Minnesota (0.00 / 0)
In essence. He proposed making such more apparent by melding the senate and house. No one really took him seriously, but it did spark some discussion.

I'm against the idea on principle. Principle being that I prefer to see political power distributed as widely as possible. Its kind of the antithesis of "too big to fail". Call it "too dispersed to dominate".

More in tune with the diary, I might suggest the issue is more along the lines of the Money Party diary from yesterday, rather than unicameralism. Not so much that the Senate is weak, as a good portion of the members in either house (and regardless of party affiliation) are responding to the same external forces.

Or, perhaps its an evolutionary response to the unitary executive, which has been the norm for quite a while. Matching a consolidation of power with a consolidation of power.

"It sounds wrong...
     ...but its right."

Is the House really any more democratic than the Senate? (0.00 / 0)
Chris,

A lot of people are concerned with the Senate not being democratic (note the small "d"). But of course the Senate was never supposed to be democratic. So it is at least currently fulfilling the role planned by the founders. You and I might not like it, but that being the case, I think it makes it difficult to change.

But what about the House? Is there really a big difference, structurally, between 100 representing 300 million and 435 representing 300 million?

I wonder what you think of this idea:
http://www.thirty-thousand.org/

We seem to think the problem is with the Senate, but what if the Senate were countered by a truly democratic House?

Don't forget to give the House their share of the blame for this... (0.00 / 0)
Because they obviously are also privy and bought into this system. Most representatives are politicians at the core, and so it is my belief that they don't wish to challenge the big leagues for fear of losing the chance to play with the big boys. (excuse the language, but its true as you point out its mostly white men in the senate)
Now I understand that there are obviously obstructionist members of congress, but they are a shrinking force these days, at least on the house side of things. Who do we see  championing them these days, Bachmann? Come on now, its a joke.  
Ultimately I don't see much changing until we get some organizing and risk-taking happening in those chambers.
Who are the organizers moving an agenda and with a strategy in there right now? I'd like to think its the "progressives", but I don't really see it.
Will the CBC do another limited hunger strike to bring awareness to the issues of urban gentrification and low employment? Will the CPC members hold their senate counterparts accountable by bringing heat back in their districts? Wouldnt it be something to see "progressives" hold Feinstein accountable for hinting at not supporting labor law reform (Employee Free Choice Act)

obviously I'm totally leaving the beyond the hill analysis out, and I think a huge part of the problem is we are expected to give congress a free ride whenever they do something that's questionable because we're all told we need to "support our team".... all actors on the stage need to re-evaluate our roles, from citizen to organized group, from elected official to public servants.

Blocking > Pushing? (4.00 / 2)
Why are we assuming that blocking legislation is more important than writing or pushing legislation?  Put it this way, if the House didn't exist do you think we would have passed the same bills and they would have looked the same?  I don't.  I think the bills would have been much more conservative and some bills might never even come up in the first place.
My thoughts exactly (0.00 / 0)

[ Parent ]
Why? (0.00 / 0)
Are you suggesting, that if the Senate were not able to check the House, House members would be voting for things they didn't want to see enacted into law?  I don't understand.
[ Parent ]
He's saying that good bills originate from the House (0.00 / 0)
Because they are popular, the Senate is forced to act.  If we didn't have a highly progessive house, the bill would never exist in the first place.

So, yes, the Senate ends up being an editor, but they're editing a document that the House wrote.

[ Parent ]
A center-right Senate... (0.00 / 0)
will obviously block left wing policies, as well as the most extreme right wing policies. Immigration reform, mortgage cramdown, and most of your other examples were too liberal for the center-right Senate, whereas drilling in ANWR and Social Security privatization were too far to the right.

I really wish we had a center-left Senate. Considering we have 60 "Democrats", we should. But the corporate caucus seems to dominate with about 53 votes based on the mortgage cramdown vote.

Ending the filibuster would help tremendously. I really wish more people were involved politically and would put pressure on their Senators to act in their best interests. Millions of folks facing foreclosure probably don't realize that their beloved Senator f--ked them in the ass just recently.

America Has a Unicameral Legislature | 26 comments
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