The Senate

As my thinking has developed, I have concluded that the essential change that needs to be made in the government is to subordinate the Senate to the House. This may sound like an impossible change, but I do not think so. In fact I find support for the change in the Constitution, of all places. The Constitution specifies, in Article I, Section 7, that "All bills for raising Revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives: but the Senate may propose or concur with Amendments as on other Bills."

I interpret this to mean that for the Founders the role of the Senate in the legislature was intended to be only to accept bills sent to it from the House, or to suggest amendments to the bills. In fact this was the way the Senate operated at the beginning of the government, until about 1809. It turned out that the Senate actually did not have much to do.

This changed, quite without any reference to the Constitution or the intent of the Founders, when the Senate asserted that it was the equal of the House, just as representative of the people, and just as able to initiate legislation. The Senate "reconstituted" itself between 1809 and 1829, and became the Senate we have today. This change occurred without any legislation, as a result of changes in the internal rules and procedures of the Senate, that the House accepted.

It is my position that the House can just as easily decide to no longer accept the changes the Senate claimed in 1809-1829. It could do so by making it a House rule that it will no longer accept legislation initiated by the Senate. Bills passed by the House would be sent to the Senate for their acceptance or proposed amendments, with a time limit for the response of the Senate.

If the Senate does nothing in that time limit, the House would assume that the Senate approves of the bill. If the Senate suggests amendments, the House would consider and accept or reject the amendments, and then would consider the bill passed as amended, and it would be sent to the President. The Senate would return to being the clearly subordinate part of the legislature, and the House would be in control.

The likelihood of the House making such a move at present is almost nil, but if it were to become a topic of serious discussion, its possibility might increase.