Supermajority voting requirements

[SteveA]

Most the time when people think of democracy they assume majority rules. So if a bill were proposed to reduce pedestrian traffic congestion and 101 people felt pedestrians should walk on the right hand side of the street while 100 felt it should be the left, we might assume the 1 person margin would be enough in a pure democracy to pass such a law.

Such an example would seem ridiculous and we don't often find such laws passed but I think that such a view of democracy was never intended when the Constitution was written.

Look at the amendment process for the Constitution. I forget the exact requirement but it's something like 3/4ths of the states voting through their respective legislative bodies by a 2/3rds majority to change the rules of the game.

Look at the jury system. Why didn't they just require a majority of the jurors to agree, instead of a unanimous verdict to enforce a law? This system seems to be specifically designed to deny a 50% majority supported law to be enforced (6 out of 12 jurors isn't nearly enough to convict anyone).

Consider that the most critical functions of government - protection against theft and violence etc., would be widely agreed upon, yet the more questionable ones like Social Security or traffic light cameras would likely not receive as large of a support.

Is there a reason why police should act upon a slim majority decision in some regard, or should we leave more freedom in private matters so as to protect minority desires?

Consider if something like a 75-80% majority were required to enforce some law, would this reduce the level of political conflict we see, while still addressing the most important issues?

I think the U.S. was never originally designed with the intent that a 50.0001% majority vote was enough to justify government action against the 49.9999% minority.

Not only would we have fewer laws, but they would be more intuitive and with fewer people desiring to break them, if we required a more unanimous verdict to pass laws. This would go a long way to reduce costs and conflicts and leave much more elbow room in private matters.

Sure, there might be something that some people feel is critical to address but couldn't get enough support to pass with greater majority requirements, but that wouldn't in anyway deny those same people from addressing these things privately either. Not everything needs to be a public matter and we'd be better of, IMO, if less were.
In private matters we effectively have the requirement of things being unanimous, because you can't force someone to join in some private agreement/venture if they don't desire to. We might not need that level of agreement but rasing the bar would make laws more similar to those customs/standards people expect in their private affairs.

Who else sees the possible benefits of this? Supermajority voting requirements created the Bill of Rights. Coincidence?

[ibm]

i think things, take general election for example, are a little different in some other parts of the world. yes?

personally i’d favor a super-majority (be it 2/3 or 3/4) over a simple majority. simple majority often times in a sense is, as some put it, “barbaric”; as 51% can kill the other 49%. and majority rule is not the only part that constitutes a democracy.

in our country, i’d like first see the end of the electoral college and the beginning of a popular vote. when it comes to general elections, i’m leaning towards a 2/3 majority than a simple majority. but how practical is it, at least in a short term? i am not quite sure.

[tman_ndsu08]

Quote by: SteveA Most the time when people think of democracy they assume majority rules. So if a bill were proposed to reduce pedestrian traffic congestion and 101 people felt pedestrians should walk on the right hand side of the street while 100 felt it should be the left, we might assume the 1 person margin would be enough in a pure democracy to pass such a law. Such an example would seem ridiculous and we don't often find such laws passed but I think that such a view of democracy was never intended when the Constitution was written. Look at the amendment process for the Constitution. I forget the exact requirement but it's something like 3/4ths of the states voting through their respective legislative bodies by a 2/3rds majority to change the rules of the game. Look at the jury system. Why didn't they just require a majority of the jurors to agree, instead of a unanimous verdict to enforce a law? This system seems to be specifically designed to deny a 50% majority supported law to be enforced (6 out of 12 jurors isn't nearly enough to convict anyone). Consider that the most critical functions of government - protection against theft and violence etc., would be widely agreed upon, yet the more questionable ones like Social Security or traffic light cameras would likely not receive as large of a support. Is there a reason why police should act upon a slim majority decision in some regard, or should we leave more freedom in private matters so as to protect minority desires? Consider if something like a 75-80% majority were required to enforce some law, would this reduce the level of political conflict we see, while still addressing the most important issues? I think the U.S. was never originally designed with the intent that a 50.0001% majority vote was enough to justify government action against the 49.9999% minority. Not only would we have fewer laws, but they would be more intuitive and with fewer people desiring to break them, if we required a more unanimous verdict to pass laws. This would go a long way to reduce costs and conflicts and leave much more elbow room in private matters. Sure, there might be something that some people feel is critical to address but couldn't get enough support to pass with greater majority requirements, but that wouldn't in anyway deny those same people from addressing these things privately either. Not everything needs to be a public matter and we'd be better of, IMO, if less were. In private matters we effectively have the requirement of things being unanimous, because you can't force someone to join in some private agreement/venture if they don't desire to. We might not need that level of agreement but rasing the bar would make laws more similar to those customs/standards people expect in their private affairs. Who else sees the possible benefits of this? Supermajority voting requirements created the Bill of Rights. Coincidence?

Not only that, how about less people voting in the first place?


Why should toothless bubba down in the trailer court's vote on whether or not there needs to be a runway extention at the municipal airport matter?!

[ibm]

Quote by: tman_ndsu08 ...Why should toothless bubba down in the trailer court's vote on whether or not there needs to be a runway extention at the municipal airport matter?!

could it beacuse he has a son or grand son who works or owns a contractor company that might be benefiting from the new runway?

just a thought.

[rcne]

If reform is in mind. I would favor a weighted voting system. Much like ancient Greece. Land owner votes count more than just a citizen.

I would also weigh more toward the higher the IQ or a college degree the higher the vote counts.

Now I'm not being totally unreasonable here. Say a landowner's vote would count for 2. Say a college degree holders vote would count for 2. Say a person of intellect (standardized tests) would count for 2.

So the most weight anyone would have would be 6, what would be so wrong with that?

(I can almost hear the howls coming from the balcony now)

[ibm]

Quote by: rcne If reform is in mind. I would favor a weighted voting system. Much like ancient Greece. Land owner votes count more than just a citizen. I would also weigh more toward the higher the IQ or a college degree the higher the vote counts. Now I'm not being totally unreasonable here. Say a landowner's vote would count for 2. Say a college degree holders vote would count for 2. Say a person of intellect (standardized tests) would count for 2. So the most weight anyone would have would be 6, what would be so wrong with that? (I can almost hear the howls coming from the balcony now)

say a nice kid who has the same name of his awefully rich and powerful dad (add “jr.”) and goes to yale become the president.

say a hero named mao rule the land of china.

smarter, richer and more educated ones get more saying. i see where you come from and it’s not totally out of whack. but i just don’t think it’s right.

[SteveA]

Quote by: ibm i think things, take general election for example, are a little different in some other parts of the world. yes? personally i’d favor a super-majority (be it 2/3 or 3/4) over a simple majority. simple majority often times in a sense is, as some put it, “barbaric”; as 51% can kill the other 49%. and majority rule is not the only part that constitutes a democracy.

Yes, that's the way I've come to see it also. It's almost a view of might makes right.

in our country, i’d like first see the end of the electoral college and the beginning of a popular vote. when it comes to general elections, i’m leaning towards a 2/3 majority than a simple majority. but how practical is it, at least in a short term? i am not quite sure.

I think ultimately general social forces determine the path a country takes, or at least set a limit to the scope the leaders in power at the time have to work with. This is true from communism in Russia to any other country in the world. At a minimum you've got to "educate" (a.k.a. brainwash) a populace if you want them to do something against their own interests. When you get down to it, though laws or a leader might say one thing, it's still up to every individual to make a personal decision regarding the issue.

So, yes, just like customs or general societal standards in any community, there are real undeniable democratic social forces that affect everyone, whether or not a government even exists.

The benefit of having written laws is that it can reduce some conflict in that some standards of conduct are easily visible and this can save some confusion, so I agree that there could be a benefit to having some form of government to be considered "official" for most people. But ultimately, such a system should still remain explicit in acknowledging that individual dissent can and does occur and it's a tradeoff as to whether or not it's worth sacrificing that person "for the greater good". I think society and individual decisions are much more complex than most political bodies can understand. Any that's why, unless there's something close to a clear unanimous opinion, sacrificing people for the sake of someone else is a bad idea. Who would sign up for such a system and is it really necessary most the time?

Anyway, I drifted off a bit because I've come to believe democracy is something to be avoided as much as possible, yet it also rather undeniably exists. You could create any form of government you wanted but if a leaders decision upset most the population in any major way, things would be changed rather quickly. So any form of government seems to require some method to vent off democratic forces to be enduring.

Another issue with democracy is that it often counts everyones interest in an issue equally. If, for example, you had 99 people vote to take every possession from the 1 person who opposed it, the voting ignores the fact that the 1 person ideally should have 100% say in the matter, because we'll assume the resources were created by that person.

There is also an indirect benefit to the electoral college in that if one state uses corrupt voting techniques, it isolates the effect to swinging only a single state. Most presidential margins are rather small, and a single corrupt state could create a large enough margin to swing the effective votes of many other states. (That's just an indirect problem that would be a non-issue if we could assure a more reliable voting system ... but sadly, I don't know how you could do that ... pencil and paper in boxes counted visibly by the public still seems the most reliable method to me).

And then as you implied there's the other issue of it just being impractical, at least on any large scale, to have many people voting on many issues.

A decent solution could be something like a Constitution voted on directly by the populace and requiring a supermajority vote to pass, with few specifics in it. Instead of really operating a large scale government by direct democracy, it might be possible to instead just have the general framework and rights voting on in a direct democratic fashion, and if a large majority of the population supported the idea, it would likely be implemented efficiently with, by definition, little opposition.

Well, maybe this post will at least give you some ideas to mull over.

The ideal form of government I think would be having diverse local communities. This would not only demonstrate the value of different philosophies/systems of government but provide more of a buffet of possible lifestyles in America. It would also reduce much of the political conflict because people wouldn't need to fight as much over having an issue resolved one or the other, instead it would be easier for people to just live in areas compatible with their views/lifestyle and avoid conflict over these things in the first place, but it's difficult to do as more issues are moved into being centrally addressed for everyone. You also don't have to worry as much about assuming responsibility for the costs/resources used by government this way, because each community can much more directly see the costs associated with various decisions, whereas in a centralized form you can have some areas subsidizing other areas with the other areas voting to increase these subsidies - it detaches freedom from responsibility for those decision, which is an unstable situation.