When Jim Jeffords sort of switched sides, as a Canuck I got a brief lesson in American constitutional practice: with a 50-50 split in the Senate, the Republicans were considered the majority party because Dick Cheney, filling his Vice Presidential role as President of the Senate, would naturally break ties to the GOP.
I was wondering this:
This seems to indicate that the Republican Party in Congress and the Republican Party in the election of the Executive are one and the same entities, and that congressional Republicans and a Republican Administration would rarely disagree… am I mistaken?
Say Nader had won the election and there had been a 50-50 Rep-Dem split (this is obviously before the Jeffords defection). Would constitutional practice have required Nader’s VP to pick a side as the “majority party” in the Senate for the purposes of determining the agenda and committee chairmanships?
My recommendation is for you guys to give DC one, and only one, Senator, to bring the total to 101. Like that’ll happen.
Yes, the Republican Party of the executive branch and the Republican party in Congress are the same political entity. As to whether that means they will agree, well, parties have platforms and theoretically members of the party will work to further the goals of its party as expressed in its platform. But there is always room for individual disagreement among the membership of the party (usually expressed in terms of “wings” of the party) and there are some people who are party-affiliated in name only and pretty much go their own way.
Had the Nader/LaDuke ticket won, I’m guessing that the parties would have engaged in the same sort of power-sharing negotiation that they did under the Bush/Cheney administration, only more so because neither party would have the guaranteed tie-breaking vote of the VP. From a technical standpoint, the Republicans controlled the 50-50 Senate because of the Republican administration. The 50-50 split was unprecedented, but there is nothing in the Constitution which requires the Vice-president when acting as president of the Senate to choose a side to support.
Here’s the relevant portion of the Constitution which discusses the VP’s role in the Senate. Article I section 3:
To piggyback a question on your question, can a historical type tell me what mechanism the Senate used to decide who had an initial two-year, four-year and six-year term?
You are mistaken. The Republicans in Congress and the Republican in the White House, while agreeing on much can also disagree a lot. George Bush is president, not the prime minister. He can ask for legislation, but no one has to introduce it. Congress and the White House have only disagreed on policy issues in years that have contained digits 0 through 9.
There is no constitutional practice for choosing the majority leader. Parties don’t exist in the constitution. The practice of giving the principal authority for organizing the Senate’s business to the Majority Leader is a custom that the Senate decided on its own. I don’t know if it’s ever come up, but if there were a third party VP and the Senate were split 50-50, I would assume that the VP (upon orders from the President) would designate someone as the Majority Leader. That way, somebody will be in charge. The VP just presides over the Senate and he only does that on rare occasions.
As for giving DC one senator that would present some formidable Constitutional hurdles. First of all, DC isn’t a state. It doesn’t have any representatives in Congress (it has a delegate, who gets to vote in committees only and can participate in debates on the floor). And the Constitution also states that you can’t deprive a state of equal suffrage in the Senate. It would be far too much trouble to amend all the necessary parts of the Constitution, especially since any DC senator will likely be a Democrat and that is unlikely to change.
Damn slow Net connection, I’m going to post it anyway.
Article I Section 3 of the Constitution:
The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each state, chosen by the legislature thereof, for six years; and each Senator shall have one vote.
Immediately after they shall be assembled in consequence of the first election, they shall be divided as equally as may be into three classes. The seats of the Senators of the first class shall be vacated at the expiration of the second year, of the second class at the expiration of the fourth year, and the third class at the expiration of the sixth year, so that one third may be chosen every second year; and if vacancies happen by resignation, or otherwise, during the recess of the legislature of any state, the executive thereof may make temporary appointments until the next meeting of the legislature, which shall then fill such vacancies.