Re:constitution
Unitary legislative leadership and functional bicameralism
So, I’ve mentioned my thesis off-hand a couple of times, and I thought I’d go through my ideal reforms to the United States. This is mostly inspired by me posting this screen-shot.
So that chart is a bit complicated: the TLDR of this system of government is national majorities with national mandates and a national orientation with national accountability.
It is sorta semi-presidentialism? as in “presidentialism with some parliamentary aspects” not “executive president and executive prime minister.”
My key aversion to parliamentary government is that I believe it tends to render a legislative body into a mere traffic light, not an actually empowered entity in its own right. I don’t think parliamentary systems are the devil, I just want more value for money out of my system government. I want a legislature to be an effective deliberative body that can render continual checks on the executive, beyond just the coup de grâce of a vote of no confidence. I like separation of powers because it is important to be able to hold each branch of government accountable for its actions (which is of course dependent on having an information environment that actually is able to report on the goings of governance, but that is a flaw with any government). Overall, I ardently believe there are many paths to successful governance.
What follows is a revised excerpt from my thesis that covers my governmental reforms. The two largest alterations are the creation of a unitary legislative leadership structure and functional bicameralism. A unitary legislative leader is effective a non-executive prime minister, a Speaker of Congress, while functional bicameralism is dividing the chambers by role not just method of election and apportionment. That would see a superior ‘overslature’ primarily manage legislation and appropriations while an inferior ‘underslature’ would primarily manage oversight and revision.
basically TLDR
The core of this Third Reconstruction must be reconstructing a new Congress, constituted from three primary entities: a progressive apportioned and proportionally represented House of Representatives as the superior overslature, a degressively apportioned Senate as the inferior underslature, and American Chancellery of an indirectly elected Chancellor of the United States, and appointed officers to serve as the chief legislator and instrument of Congressional unity.
A. The New House of Representatives
The House will be the axis on which governance turns, the center of gravity of national politics. The House will be the superior chamber of Congress in order to remove an internal veto point that creates a paralytic and indigent legislature. To restore Congress, one chamber must be granted primacy over legislation. This will further entail substantial departures in the method of election and apportionment of the House.
The House of Representatives must be representative of the people, and it will struggle to do so as Congressional districts become ever larger. The size of Congress is quite literally stuck in the past, fixed by the 1929 Apportionment act to 435 members. Instead of being arbitrarily fixed the House should be apportioned by a “rounded Wyoming rule.” This would fix the representative-per-capita ratio to the size of the smallest state of the union (currently Wyoming) to determine the size of the House. That number would be rounded up to the nearest five or zero, primarily for aesthetic purposes but also to prevent massively disparate sizes between per-capita apportionment. Further, non-state territories must be apportioned full representation, with all territories being granted at least one full Representative. This system of apportionment would increase the House of Representatives to a size of approximately 575 Representatives. (Instead of granting statehood, granting representation to territories allows the people living there to have a full say in their government and also potentially seek independence—a right that would be lost with statehood; 567 State Representatives + 4 Territorial Representatives = 571 which is then rounded up to 575)
First past the post, always runs the risk of anti-majoritarian results, as seen in 2012 Elections where Democrats won the cumulative vote for the House by nearly 1.5 million votes but did not regain a majority. To prevent such an outcome, this proposed House would be elected by Mixed-Member Proportional (MMP) Voting. This system balances constituency links with proportionality by giving each citizen two votes, one for a constituency candidate and the other for a party list. Once a party crosses a threshold of 5% of the national vote, or wins 5 constituencies, that party is entitled to a proportion of the House seats equal to that of their list vote, with lists being drawn at the state level. The guiding light of this system must be, ironically, the “second” vote for a party, as the intention is to ensure a truly proportional result, including and up to a full seat compensation mechanism.
The effects and intentions of adopting MMP are at least two-fold—increasing both party strength and party choice. Each individual party would have much more control over their candidates because of the use of lists, from which candidates can be struck or dropped down without much recourse. Lists would allow parties to be more homogenous within themselves, and for more choices between parties. Instead of choosing between two big-tent parties that still are effectively coalitions-under-one-banner, voters under American MMP would be allowed to vote directly for constituent elements of those coalitions. This means all voters would not only choose which coalition wins, but also which elements of that coalition would be strongest. The ideal result of this system would be a two-coalition, approximately five-party system. Two formalized standing coalitions, one left-leaning, and one right-leaning. Parties in these coalitions would unite and select a common candidate for Presidential elections (and potentially Senate elections) but would otherwise remain independent of each other. Our current two parties would be broken down into their constituent factions but would remain tethered together.
The House of Representatives would serve three main functions: passing legislation, holding confidence in the Chancellery, and holding trials of impeachment. The House would be able to pass legislation by simple majority and constitutional amendments by two-thirds supermajority. However, with an override petition from the Chancellor of the United States, the House may override a suspensory Senate veto with a three-fifths “over-majority;” otherwise the suspension shall last one year and afterward the House may pass the legislation by simple majority. The House would vote to confirm the chancellor and may only hold a constructive vote of no confidence in the chancellor, (meaning the chancellor may only be replaced if there is a replacement backed with a new working majority). The House may find no confidence in the other officers of the Congressional Chancellery, and vote them down with no ready replacement. The House may introduce any legislation but must introduce mandatory (i.e. spending) legislation and programmatic (i.e. priority policy) legislation. The House would serve as the petite jury in trials of impeachment and may convict a federal official with a two-thirds supermajority vote.
The House would be the focal point of the legislative and policy process as it would be able to pass legislation over the objections of the Senate. As the superior branch and the branch closest to the people, it would also confirm Congressional leadership (and ensure that Congressional leadership has an actual working majority). Power would rest with the people through their representatives, who could be replaced with ease when compared to our current system of first past the post. Parties would be stronger within themselves, meaning voters would know what they are getting with their vote; at the same time parties can be fractured between themselves, which ensures that no majority is entrenched as they can lose a coalition partner relatively easily. All of this in the hope to ensure that Congress operates on a simple maxim, “Does it have a majority of votes on the floor of the House?”
B. The New Senate
Senate changes must be much deeper than the House, as the Senate’s functional orientation would be shifted considerably towards oversight and not legislation. This Senate would not be a duplicate of the House, it would remain a slower, smaller, and more deliberative body, weaker than its current form.
There would be significant changes to the method of apportionment, moving from equal to degressive apportionment; and to ensure that the House remains the primary chamber, the popular mandates of senators must be consciously weakened. This new Senate will be degressively apportioned into three blocks: the top ten most populous states would be apportioned four senators each, the next twenty states by population would accordingly be apportioned three senators each, the bottom twenty-three states would be apportioned two senators each, and finally, each territory would be apportioned one senator. This would result in a Senate of 150 senators. (Re-apportionment of Senate seats amongst the blocks would occur with every decennial census. For purposes of this proposal, the number of states would be 53, the current 50 plus Washington D.C., Puerto Rico, and a mechanism for the representation of sovereign indigenous tribes along the lines of the Barsh-Henderson proposal for federal representation of American Indians or Maori list of New Zealand. The four territories would be Guam, American Samoa, the Northern Marianas, and the US Virgin Islands. Any admissions of new states or changes to the representations of territories must be based on the self-determination of the people living in said states/territories; thus the total number of senators would be 150 (146 State senators + 4 Territorial senators.)
This new apportion is vital to allow a dynamic Senate; as its apportionment shifts, so do the majorities that it can produce. The current Senate majority is entrenched because it does not shift, and an entrenched majority is one that is freer to trample upon the rights of minorities or even the majority, without reproach. The intention of a degressive apportion Senate is to ensure that the Senate has fluid majorities, and is not just a smaller House of Representatives, as the difference between the smallest state and largest can only ever be two senators.[5]
Likewise, the manner of the election of senators is significantly revised—with the adoption of a novel mixed direct-indirect system of election, “Slate-Ballot Voting.” Parties with state legislators or statewide officers may select a Senate candidate from amongst that number. Once a candidate has been selected (the slate) they go to the polls (the ballot) under Ranked Choice Voting in a single-member statewide district, thus Slate-Ballot. This voting system allows for three main benefits: a deeper state government-senator connection for an ostensibly federal chamber, forcing aspirants of the Senate to work in state government, and an intentional democratic deficit (as a Senate with a popular mandate like the House could potentially threaten the primacy of the House of Representatives). Further, simple direct election of senators, the current model, would be duplicative of state party lists in the House under MMP. Thus, Slate-Ballot Voting allows for a more effective compliment to the House of Representatives and American MMP.[6]
Unlike the House, the Senate would specialize in the oversight of the executive, revision of legislation, and reviews of ongoing matters. The Senate has a distinct functional separation from the House, allowing legislators to specialize in a role without sacrificing another portion of their duties. A functional division of labor between the House and the Senate will increase the quality of legislating and oversight by specializing and separating members of Congress into those fields.
For the last two matters, revision and review, the Senate’s great tool of influence would be formal reports from Special Topic Committees. The Senate would issue reports evaluating pressing matters or matters that have been given insufficient discussion and issue notes on legislation as its being drafted in the House or amend legislation itself during passage.
The Senate would possess unique powers for overseeing the executive; namely, the Senate would possess an atomic bomb of sorts—the subpoena magnae. This strengthened subpoena allows the committees to access any requested information that has been restricted due to the invocation of executive privilege. This gives the Senate a unique advantage when it comes to overseeing the executive. The Executive cannot escape a Senatorial subpoena magnae. A subpoena magnae is not an idle action and could only be issued by an officially designated ‘formal investigative committee’ after refusal to respond to a “normal” subpoena, and then may only be issued by a two-thirds majority vote of that committee. (The designation “formal investigative committee” would include standing committees with executive departments under their portfolio, but a subpoena magnae shall only be authorized for investigations of that committee’s relevant department(s). i.e., the Department of Defense would be under the purview of the Armed Services Committee while the Executive Office of the President and the Department of Justice would be under the purview of the Judiciary Committee.)
If an executive official were to refuse a subpoena magnae, they would be subject to impeachment proceedings, and failure to comply with such a subpoena would constitute an enumerated impeachment offense, like treason. If any member of the committee or individual with access to the information obtained by a subpoena magnae were to disseminate any such information without the consent of that body, said individual would be subject to immediate sanction under inherent contempt, a power to be possessed solely by the Senate. Likewise, if a senator were to disclose information gained by a subpoena magnae without the consent of the Senate, that senator would be subject to an expulsion vote by a simple majority, not the normal super majority. Information obtained by a subpoena magnae may only be revealed during an impeachment inquest by a majority vote on the floor. A subpoena magnae is a dangerous action for all involved, but it is the final say in ensuring legislative primacy.
The Senate would have priorities and powers outside of executive oversight, general review, and legislative revision. The Senate, as the primary legislative inquest body, would have the sole power of impeachment by a majority vote. The Senate would also be able to introduce personal bills, so it would have legislative authority—if not generally used. The Senate would retain its current powers to confirm all executive and judicial appointees (by a majority vote) and ratify all treaties (by a two-thirds majority vote). The Senate would be a majoritarian body, with a two-tier veto. If legislation fails to acquire majority support but has at least two-fifths affirmative support (60 senators), it would only be delayed by one year or until a successful override vote in the House. If a measure has more than three-fifth of senators (91 senators) in opposition, it is defeated substantively. Only a united Senate can stop a majority in the House, but only on certain varieties of legislation (to be discussed later). The Senate will be transformed from a super-majoritarian deliberative body to a majoritarian oversight body, secondary to the House of Representatives.
The purpose of the Senate is threefold—to suspend, to specialize, and to federalize. The Senate’s (primary) delaying power can prevent a united, but narrow, majority in the House from implementing sweeping reforms before opposition can rally and oppose such a move. The Senate can slow the House to give it time for a House majority to collapse under public pressure; but a truly united Senate can stop the House as a final institutional emergency brake. The Senate also allows members of the House to specialize in policy development and implementation, no longer having to divide their time between oversight and legislation. Members of Congress instead will specialize by their function, a benefit to the citizenry who would then have a guarantee of a member of Congress who has a specialized oversight and a member of Congress who has specialized in policymaking. Finally, because of the need for a weak mandate to justify its inferior inter-cameral status, the Senate can be a more expressly federal body and tighten the relationship between state governments and the federal government.
C. The Congressional Chancellery
The Chancellery is the collective noun denoting the offices of Chancellor of the United States, Vice Chancellor of the United States, and the four Consuls of the United States. They represent the leadership of the parties constituting a majority in the House of Representatives uniquely empowered to ensure the good conduct and management of both chambers of Congress. As such, they shall serve as non-voting members of both chambers. The Chancellery is the leadership of Congress-in-Whole. Currently, Congressional leadership is always faced with the tension between their constituents and their role as national leaders. They are not directly responsible to national pressure—only pressured by their caucus and their home district. To ensure national leadership, leaders should be nationally responsible and have power over the entire legislative branch, not just one chamber.
The Chancellor of the United States would be the chief legislator—the United States’ second, but not secondary, national leader. The process of the election and selection of the chancellor has three steps. First, parties nominate a candidate for chancellor. Second, those names appear next to their respective party’s name on the list ballot—meaning that party votes are also direct votes for their candidate for chancellor. Third, there is the process of ratification of a chancellor, which begins when the candidate/party with the greatest number of party-votes attempts to form a majority in the House. If that party/candidate is unable to form a majority, then the second-place party/candidate may attempt to form a majority, and so on until a majority is formed. A majority is formed when a chancellor is confirmed by a majority vote on the floor of the House. After a chancellor has been installed, they must nominate a vice chancellor and four consuls. The consuls would have the portfolios of: Foreign and Security Affairs, Economic and Fiscal Affairs, Justice and Governmental Affairs, and Social and Civil Affairs. Those five officers must be confirmed by majority vote as well. This process allows Congressional leadership to claim a national mandate. However, there must also be a fail-safe mechanism to ensure that a candidate for chancellor not only has popular support, but a working majority in the House of Representatives. (If no formal candidate is able to form a majority, then any member may attempt to form a majority. If that also fails, Congress dissolves for new elections.)
The structure of the Chancellery is arranged to designate a popular claimant to legislative leadership and for that claimant to assemble a team, to lead Congress, and forge a working majority by divvying out influence and authority (primarily through the consuls and programmatic bills). This creates positions of leadership not torn between local parochial concerns and the welfare of the nation. The Chancellery allows for national leadership, with a national outlook, and a national mandate. It creates a clear line of responsibility for what goes on in Congress—across both chambers.
The Office of Chancellor shall individually possess two important powers: the override petition and the call for snap elections. The override petition allows a three-fifths House majority to enact legislation over the Senate’s suspensive veto. The override petition may also be used to forward a bill out of committee or directly for a debate on the floor. The override petition allows the chancellor to trade time for votes (skipping the legislative delay) and reward loyal partisans by speeding their personal bills out of committee. The snap election is not an unlimited power, however, as the chancellor may only call a snap election after an “inciting requirement.” Inciting requirements would be enumerated by statute to include at least: the failure to pass a mandatory bill, the substantive defeat of a programmatic bill, and the loss of confidence in the chancellor with no possibility of a constructive vote of no confidence. Inciting requirements are not permanent, and the window could close if the requirements become unfulfilled. Snap elections would not permanently disrupt the schedule of Congress, as Congressional elections must be held alongside a presidential election. The “inciting requirement” is an intentional procedural hurdle to prevent perpetual elections, while still maintaining the ability to refresh a Congress in the event of the breakdown of a majority coalition before a scheduled election date. The override petition allows for leadership to both reward individual members of Congress by fast-tracking their bills, while also allowing leadership to have an advantage when it comes to passing their policy program. In short, the override petition is the chancellor’s carrot, and the snap election is their stick. (Under this model, the Presidential term would be extended to one six-year term wih the possibility of a three-year extension. These elections would serve as electoral tent poles.)
The chancellor would further chair the Joint Committee on Procedure and Scrutiny (COMPAS)—which would serve as the highest directive body of Congress. COMPAS serves to formalize that structure and to occasionally bring it out from the smoke of the cloakroom. It allows the leadership of the majority to organize itself but also to hold public meetings between the majority and the opposition. Its membership would include the chancellor, vice chancellor, consuls, majority floor leaders and whips of both chambers, and any such members as determined by the chancellor at the beginning of a Congress. This body may be delegated a legislative veto by legislation and further continuity of government roles, if necessary. COMPAS, by majority, shall appoint the Chairs of all Joint and Special Committees and the chair of the House Budget Committee. COMPAS may also assemble a high table committee for cross party talks and negotiations as it sees fit. Finally, all programmatic bills must be referred to COMPAS before debate on the floor of the House. (Note that the chairs of Standing Committees would be elected by the members of those committees, only the chairs of Joint or Special Committees would be appointed by COMPAS.)
COMPAS allows for collective leadership of Congress, so as to not centralize too much power in the chancellor individually. It is also a clear location for leadership to craft the bills that it has promised to pass. If leadership wants to write bills, let them; if leadership wants to negotiate, let them—but formalize the authority with transparency. At the very least force leadership bill writing from the cloak rooms into committee rooms. In other words, COMPAS serves as the formal legislative leadership committee, to bind together the majorities of both Chambers—the honest broker and the indecision breaker of Congress.
The vice chancellor primarily serves as a binding post, not dissimilar to the office of Deputy Prime Minister in the United Kingdom or Vice Chancellor in Germany. As such, it would generally be granted to the chancellor candidate of the second largest party of the majority. Beyond providing an office and platform, the vice chancellor would also be delegated a Special Joint Committee under their own discretion and would chair COMPAS in the absence of the chancellor. The chancellor may also designate the vice chancellor as Acting-Chancellor, as may COMPAS.
The consuls serve two roles: super-whips and logrolling. Like the vice chancellor, the consuls serve a “spoils system,” a role that can be distributed amongst coalition leaders as a part of coalition negotiations. Consuls are vital in bringing a multi-party majority together by giving party leaders a platform and portfolio, alongside a formal coalition agreement. Beyond their majority building capacity, consuls would serve as the connection between the Standing Committees and the Chancellery and ensure the conduct and coordination of committees in their portfolio. As such, they would serve as ex officio members on any committee under their jurisdiction. They would serve as minders for their committees—they would be whips with portfolios.
These officers serve to bind together a legislative majority but also, by their constituent less nature, serve as nationally focused leadership. Their orientation is fundamentally national, not towards any individual district or state, but rather the country as a whole, as they are dependent on a national vote and a national election.
I. The New Regular Order
The legislative process must also change with this Congress, and to address the domination of leadership driven legislating and the commonplace breakdown of the appropriations and authorizations process. To avoid this, Reconstitution would see three separate legislative pathways: the mandatory, the programmatic, and the personal. The mandatory bill is an amalgamation and simplification of the appropriations and authorizations process—these are budget bills; thus, they are mandatory. Programmatic bills are flagship pieces of legislation, they are the heart and soul of a majority’s legislative program. Finally, personal bills are what we think of as “normal” legislation, bills introduced by individual members. The product of these legislative pathways is insurance to prevent government shutdowns and to allow for a lane for priority policy legislation.[11]
Functionally the new process revises the three current options (defeat, agreement, conference committee) for legislation into five (defeat, agreement, conference committee, immediate override, suspensory override). This allows leadership options to sustain a bill that has strong support in the House but only middling support in the Senate. Unless the Senate is united in a three-fifths over-majority against a bill, it will pass if it still has a majority in the House.
Personal bills represent the baseline process. They may be introduced into either chamber. They are referred to a (no more than two) standing committee(s) for development and then returned to the floor. They must pass both the Senate and the House. A conference committee may draft a unified proposal that can then pass both chambers, if there is disagreement on the text of a bill. Unless the bill is defeated outright by a substantive veto, the House’s version will likely triumph after waiting out a delay or enacting a successful override petition. After which the bill must be signed by the President for it to become law. If the President vetoes the bill, Congress may override the veto with a two-thirds vote in both chambers.
Personal bills would remain the bulk of legislation passed under any single congress, but not the most important legislation. They do not represent the primary mission of leadership or of the standing committees—the primary missions for those group are, respectively, programmatic and mandatory bills. Personal bills represent the work of individual members, usually on local, niche, or otherwise non-spotlight claiming issues.
Programmatic bills begin in COMPAS, either in the Committee-in-Whole or in a subcommittee for that particular bill, after which the bill may be referred to up to two standing committees for further development. After the committee process, the bill is introduced into the House for debate. After passing the House, the bill follows the same process as a personal bill; the Senate does have the authority to amend and defeat programmatic bills, but may only delay a programmatic bill for six months. However, each Congress may introduce no more than six programmatic bills (generally about two per session). (COMPAS subcommittees may act as super-committees assigned to a single topic of a bill.)
Programmatic bills represent the culmination of the current process of leadership-driven legislating— but formalized so that the process of writing such important legislation becomes more transparent than it is currently and distinct from the ‘traditional’ process. Leadership-driven legislating isn’t the devil, but it should be set aside from regular order. If leadership wants to write bills, let leadership write bills. Bring the process out of the dark and into the light.
Mandatory bills have a considerably different legislative process to the other two forms of legislation because they represent a legislative-executive interaction. Mandatory bills begin as a single Presidential Budget Request which is forwarded directly to a Joint Committee on the Federal Budget which sets topline spending limits for the entire budget and each mandatory bill. The numerous mandatory bills are sent to their respective House standing committees for development and completion (i.e., the Defense Mandatory bill would be directed to the House Committee on the Armed Services). The completed bills are forwarded to the House Budget Committee and their respective Senate standing committees. The Senate standing committees would refer their notes and recommendations to the House Budget Committee, which stands as the final doorkeeper before the floor to ensure mandatory bills are integrated, non-duplicative, and obey top-line limits. After clearing House Budget, the bills are introduced onto the House floor for final debate. After passing the House, the bills are referred to the Senate. The Senate may make recommendations but cannot amend the bills.
Further, the Senate shall possess no substantive veto power over mandatory bills. If the Senate objects to a mandatory bill, the Senate may be overridden by simple majority. Afterward the budget acts are referred to the President and must be signed. If vetoed, the veto may be overridden by two-thirds of both chambers.
The mandatory bill process, though complicated, represents a significant simplification of the current budget process of budget resolutions, appropriation bills, and authorization bills. It also has significantly fewer points of failure. The mandatory bill process is significantly less likely to fail to produce a budget because it only requires a simple majority of the House. Allowing standing committees to directly handle appropriations and authorizations gives House standing committees a primary function, as vital legislation is handled by leadership and oversight is primarily handled by the Senate standing committees. House standing committees would still debate and develop legislation and hold hearings, but the lion’s share of their time would be directed toward the new budget process.
II. The New Checks and Balances
Structural changes to the legislature on the scale proposed above requires at least some modification to the other constituent branches of the American constitutional system, the executive and judiciary. These reforms need to be especially deep, just enough to sufficiently interlock with the primarily legislative reforms.
A. The Presidency
The first reform to the presidency would be a new election cycle, as four-year terms for the executive and a legislature with a three-year cycle is far from ideal. Under this proposed system, a president would be able to be elected to one six-year term with the potential for a three-year extension, instead of being elected to two four-year terms. Likewise, the president would be directly elected by Ranked Choice Voting after a set of presidential primaries (primaries can be held for a mix of uni-party candidates and cross-party candidates). This would increase the presidential term by one year overall, and any potential transgressive behavior could be limited mid-term elections in the president’s third and sixth years.
With a proportional Congress, there is the potential that the pro-presidential majority may collapse before the midterms, in response to transgressive behavior. It is easier to fracture a coalition along party lines than it is to fracture a unitary Congressional majority via individual votes. Likewise, with the creation of the chancellor, the president and vice president would no longer be the only nationally elected figures in the United State Government. The ideal relationship between the chief legislator and chief executive is that of “The Smith and the Swordbearer.” The chancellor creates and shapes national policy while the president implements the policies stated by Congress. This relationship could easily become fraught if midterms produce “cohabitation” where the president and chancellor are from opposing coalitions. However, that kind of gridlock that would result from that is the result of the voters wishing it. Facing an activist and empowered Congress and a competitive national figure in the chancellor, the presidency will be more constrained despite having a longer-term.
The President would retain their veto powers and judicial nomination authority. The presidential cabinet would also need to be reformed to come into line with a reformed congressional committee system. With the goal of ensuring that a single committee has jurisdiction over a single cabinet department. There are further plenty of opportunities for modification and reduction of delegated presidential powers—either returning them back to Congress, to the chancellor, or to some executive-legislative power sharing agreement. The Chancellery provides an opportunity to begin to walk back the imperial presidency.
B. The Judiciary
The judiciary will likewise require some modification to reverse the judicialization of politics and to accommodate a restored legislative branch. First and foremost, instituting term limits for the justices of Supreme Court. Justices would remain federal judges but simply moved off the Supreme Court, allowed to “ride the circuit” and be assigned to a circuit or appellate posting at the direction of the Chief Justice of the United States. Judicial terms would be staggered to ensure at least one Supreme Court appointment for every three-year Congressional cycle, thus for the current nine-seat court would entail 27-year terms This system would regularize the appointment of justices, ideally decreasing the incentive for parties to seek court packing. Further, modifications to the powers of the judiciary would include mandating nationwide injunctions be enacted by a three-judge panel (not by a single circuit judge), and judicial review to strike down legislation in part or in whole would require two-thirds agreement of the Supreme Court. This would help to ensure the judiciary serves as an arbitrator and instrument of uniform enforcement and reduce the likelihood of the courts serving as an unelected legislature.
Another area of critical structural reform must be to make the Constitution itself easier to amend. The current formula for amending the constitution is perilously difficult, requiring two-thirds of both chambers of Congress and ratification by at least three-quarters of the states. This makes amending the constitution nigh on impossible. An easier, but not easy, formula is needed. A new procedure for amendments would require two-thirds of both chambers of Congress and then either: a national ratification referendum by a national majority (in a majority of the states) or ratification by at least one-half of the states (that comprise at least three-fifths of the population). The polity should be able to amend its constitution. It should not be an idle task, but rather an achievable task, and one that ensures broad public buy-in while not requiring unanimous consensus.
The aim of all of these structural reforms is to create a system of clear responsibility in which a united and thorough majority of the House may introduce and implement legislation and provide the necessary means to allow public opinion and dissent to deter and defeat a divided majority. The leadership of Congress requires national responsibility and a national mandate, as is appropriate of a national legislature. In this system, there would be a more united Congress, but a Congress that can be defeated. Bicameralism that ensures that members of Congress are specialized by their functions, and that their time is not forced to be unequally and opaquely divided between the different sets of skills. Indeed, the intent of this system is to allow voters to choose from a set of strong parties, which then formally and openly negotiate for a coalition majority, instead of the current of de facto opaque coalitions.
Reconstitution is the crown jewel of a Third Reconstruction; it is an end—but it is also a beginning for a new era of majoritarian governance. This plan is a key to the great golden door that may yet unlock the potential of the United States of America.
Is there any particular reason for term limits being centered around 3 or 6 years terms rather than 2 or 4 year terms?
USIA might as well be revived