Majority Rules for a Day in the US Senate

When reading about the full Senate’s decision to back Barack Obama and eliminate funding for the F-22 note that the vote on the amendment stripping the money out passed 58-40. What’s that you say? It passed because more people voted “yes” than voted “no?” Perhaps you’ve been told that that’s not how things work in the United States Senate. Perhaps you’ve been told that “it takes 60 votes” for initiatives to pass in that body.

As you can see here, that’s simply false. The history and tradition of the Senate has always been that measures pass by majority vote. It’s also true that members would, from time to time, take advantage of procedural stalling tactics to delay majority supported legislation, most particularly legislation aimed at securing the physical safety of African-Americans from terrorist violence and similar worthy causes. In recent years, however, a tradition of routine filibustering has arisen and created a de facto 60 vote supermajority threshold. As we see in the F-22 case, however, it’s not a requirement that the Senate operate in this manner. And insofar as a large minority of Senate do decide they’re determined to try to impose a supermajority requirement on Senate action, the most reasonable response is to do away with filibustering altogether.