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They act like the old House of Lords back in the early 1800s
with the same powers, titles, wealth and privileges but now its corporate
with the exceptions of a few senators.
It took the English Civil Wars of the 1640s and the reform bill of the 1830s to get rid of its power.
The US will not diminish the Senate's powers in the foreseeable future
because it is not a parliamentary system but a federalist system
States have to be treated equally, or else the little ones will lose out. But who cares if they lose out? States don't vote. People do!
in Thomas Geoghegan's 1998 book, The Secret Lives of Citizens. Because each state is granted equal representation in the Senate regardless of population, Geoghegan writes, "a man who might own a gas station in Idaho might have more say in foreign policy than the whole Trilateral Commission."
Mindful that a filibuster can only be stopped by a vote of three-fifths of the Senate, Geoghegan calculates that 41 senators representing about 10 percent of the population can block a bill favored by 60 senators representing about 90 percent of the population.
A 90 percent majority in favor still doesn't guarantee that a law can be passed! OK, so we'll get rid of the filibuster. Given the practical difficulties of abolishing the Senate, that's a respectable fallback position. But even if the filibuster were scuttled, Geoghegan figures, 50 senators representing the 25 smallest states, and hence a mere 16 percent of the population, could still block passage of a bill favored by the other 84 percent of the population.
(Assuming, of course, the tie-breaking vice president abstained or went along with the naysayers; with 50 senators, the vice president wouldn't be a factor.) Similarly, he points out, 51 senators representing "16 percent and a bit more" could pass any bill they wished, even if 84 percent of the population opposed it. (Of course, the president, who has veto power, would have to favor the bill, too.)
Howie Hawkins, a Green Party USA candidate for Congress in New York, has slightly different numbers--the way he's figured it, 20 percent of the population, acting through its senators, can block legislation favored by 80 percent of the population--but the point remains the same.
Nebraska, the only state in the United States that has a unicameral legislature, can hardly be described as a hotbed of radicalism. Jesse Ventura wants the same thing in Minnesota. Why can't we have one in Washington, too?
In addition to being more democratic, it would also be loads more efficient. No conference committees! No duplicative hearings! And think of the office space you'd save on Capitol Hill!
This portion of my rant is from another poster:
The founding fathers and in particular james madison wrote about why they wanted this particular form of govt. They wrote about this in the federalist papers, madison's notes from the constitutional convention and in a letter to jefferson from madison.
Here is a basic summary of what they said:
They did not want democracy. In fact the primary reason the founding fathers installed our present constitution was that under the articles of confederation, the people were beginning to assert their will because under the articles of confederation, some of the several states were developing parliamentarian demcracies. That meant that the majority of working class citizens in those states were raising taxes on the rich and were allowing debt relief for people who were broke. The founding fathers, being rich, did not like that. So Madison created a type of govt that would give the appearance of democracy, but that in practice would prevent the will of the people from being exerted via the vote.
Let me tell you what madison said was the primary purpose of his new constitution: to preserve wealth inequality, to "protect the minority of the opulent against the majority," in his words. In fact, in that same paragraph he wrote that the Senate was the primary way that his constitution would achieve that goal.
Madison's new gov't would fragment the will of the people by increasing faction by increasing the size of the voting districts that elected politicians. He noted that politicians from small voting districts had to more or less follow the will of the people because in small districts the people were more able to "unite and discover their common interest" and thus force the politicians to do as the people wanted.
In larger districts that would be created under his new constitution (e.g., the office of the president and the senate), the districts were so large that there naturally existed more FACTIONS in these larger districts. More factions meant that the people were more diviided and could not thus unite and discover their common intererst and thereby make the politicians obey the will of the people.
Large districts like the entire nation (the president) and each state (the senate) were so fragmented by the factions in them that the voters would be divided and not united.
Divide et impera, wrote madison to jefferson, was how the USA should be ruled. Divide and conquer by fragment the people by increasing the number of factions in voting districts.
Madison and founding fathers created factions in voting districts by enlarging them.
In the quasi-parliamentarian governments that were growing under the articles of confederation before 1791 when the new constitution was installed, the politicians were elected from small disticts. Small meaning fewer factions and therefore more unity among voters.
OK..... Rant over but you know the Senate is the problem with our government and not the house.
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