When the Minority Rules

Although democracy typically relies on the rule of the majority, the United States Senate is the rare democratic institution in which the minority can prevail.  In the last two weeks, Republicans in the Senate, who are the minority party, used filibusters to block President Barack Obama’s nominations of Patricia Ann Millett and Nina Pillard to fill a vacant seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.  For a nominee to win a confirmation vote, a simple majority is need whereas to overcome a filibuster, a three-fifth majority is required.  Thus, filibustering allows a party with a minority in the Senate to obstruct the will of the majority.  In response, Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has floated the idea of ending the filibuster so Democrats can approve presidential nominees by a simple majority vote.  Despite the Democrats’ outrage that filibusters prevented votes on the two nominees, they used the same tactic when the roles were reversed in 2005.  And correspondingly, the Republicans who had a majority in the Senate at the time discussed the possibility of changing the filibuster rules.

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