>From the start and indeed by constitutional design the US Senate has served not to exemplify newer ideas of republican democracy but rather continuity with ancient and indeed oligarchical concepts, notably that of the Roman Senate.
But there are good reasons not to focus reform efforts on abolishing the Senate or on converting it into essentially a smaller copy of the US House. First, bicameralism has sometimes saved USA federal laws from being carried away unicamerally by fads and self-serving excess. Right now, the House seems even more ready (if that's possible) than the Senate to pass giveaways to greed, all rationalized as being needed for the war on terrorism but in fact having the opposite effect: namely weakening of the social and environmental basis of defense which the country will need for ultimate success in any struggle - including anti-terrorism. Second, the US Senate happens to be about the right size. James Madison made the point that a body of about 100 members is just big enough to prevent 'factionalism' (petty, obstructionist cliques), and yet small enough to get business done while enabling individual members to be heard to and to have influence. (Of course, just being the right size doesn't mean that the US Senate has to be constituted the way it is now, so read on.) A third reason is perhaps most important. Many of us here in the USA - at times I among them - view states as anachronistic and meaningless encumbrances to creation or efficient operation of a homogeneous US society. However, constitutionally the USA is a federation - to be sure a fairly tight federation - of states. Some of the states used to be separate nations, and indeed some of the states (like California, Florida, Texas, Alaska and Hawaii) could credibly now be. (What helps for this are factors like large area, geographic isolation, and border lands which are relatively impassable or thinly settled.) Maybe federalism in the USA still has an important and useful role, if only to provide a credible model for the rest of the world. Inherently, a federation of equal states does not jibe with notions of 'democracy' which call for representational power proportional with population (or some other given attribute of the states). But, as vehicles for true democracy, most alternative proposals are just as problematic as the status quo. For instance, where's the great democracy these days in p.r. for PARTIES and thereby de facto the cliques who control them? Joe Weinstein Long Beach CA USA _________________________________________________________________ Send and receive Hotmail on your mobile device: http://mobile.msn.com ---- For more information about this list (subscribe, unsubscribe, FAQ, etc), please see http://www.eskimo.com/~robla/em
