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Comment by tdees40 | Hacker News Reader

For anyone uninformed on this matter, a few facts:

1) The Senate is a majority body, but it requires a 60 vote (i.e. 60%) threshold to cut off debate and force a vote on a bill; otherwise, debate continues indefinitely.

2) In practice, this obviously can lead to the Senate becoming a supermajority body if filibusters are routinely exercised. In the last 5-10 years, this has become the case. For instance, this is an example of a bill that "failed" despite receiving a 54-46 vote.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2013/04...

3) This rule change would only apply to presidential appointments. The 60-vote threshold would remain in place for other bills.

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I should also be noted, for non-Americans or extremly ill informed Americans, that the Senate is already a body that is non-democratic. Every state votes for two Senators regardless of population. So even under a majority rule, Senators representing 16.9% of the population can block an appointment. Under the de facto 60 vote rule, Senators representing only 11% of the population could do so. To put that 11% in perspective, 13% of the US population is foreign born, 15.8% are baptist, 13.2% are African-American, and around 10.1% live in either the NYC or LA metropolitan statistical areas.

There is perhaps an argument to be made about the majority not riding roughshod over the minority, but in this case the threshold for a blocking minority was just too small.

The Senate was never meant to be a democratically elected body. Until the enactment of the 17th Amendment in 1913 Senators where picked by the States.

And therefore what? The people who drafted the Constitution intended the Senate to be an aristocratic body limited to white, male, landholders. Do you think that's a good idea? How far should we go to further the intentions of the drafters? Should we revive slavery?

Here's what one guy who had to miss the Constitutional convention because he was serving his nation abroad had to say:

"I set out on this ground, which I suppose to be self evident, that the earth belongs in usufruct to the living." (Thomas Jefferson)

And therefore if it needs updating it has always needed updating, unless something else changed. I agree with you that this is often overstressed but it is a useful perspective.

> The Senate was never meant to be a democratically elected body.

This is true only for very bizarre definitions of "never".

> Until the enactment of the 17th Amendment in 1913 Senators where picked by the States.

That's pretty good evidence that from 1913 on, the Senate was meant to be a democratically elected body.

>> 3) This rule change would only apply to presidential appointments. The 60-vote threshold would remain in place for other bills.

However, this sets a very convenient precedent to expand the new rules for legislation should a caucus ever want it badly enough.

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