Honing a rag tag army and a belligerent insurgency into a working democracy is not an easy task. Revolutions usually start as a minority movement and grow into a majority onslaught. An historian pointed out some decades ago that a revolution cannot succeed until it is accepted by educators and clergy (schools and churches) Once these two institutions realize the rightness of revolution the victory is guaranteed.

When we think back on the American Revolution we tend to forget the huge and mostly unpopular sentiment against it. Royalists were patriots. Revolutionists were terrorists. Between the two there was anger, animosity, hostility and murder. The burning of ‘Tory” houses and the forced movement of Royalist was no less disturbing than the artless arguments and slanders that erupted in conventions called to mold a country out of raw ideas. But the revolution won the day and now was going to win the country.

George Washington emerged from the signing of the Constitution with a cryptic statement that defined the Republic. “Gentlemen,” he said. “Today we have a document which, for the first time in history, gives power to the majority!” The birth of this country was built on the foundation of majority rule and minority tolerance. Limited in democracy, through representation, the Republic, nevertheless, would operate under power given it by majority. That is: fifty percent + 1. Simple.

No sooner had the idea emerged than it came under attack. Was a simple majority a real majority? And, if only by one, does that not make the margin too narrow to truly represent the whole? Revisionists immediately came out to define when a simple majority applied and when greater voice must be given to the minority views. There were some landslide decisions made on this issue; one of these (in 1954) now defines the make up of our congress. The Supreme Court realized that population shifts had moved from rural to urban but the representation had not. The court ruled: One man one vote. Over night our representative government recognized the majority urban community and the birth of social liberalism. But even before then small democratic organizations and larger government operations started to accept majority as two-thirds not the one-half plus one that is mathematically correct but socially unacceptable for popular representation. What the two-thirds rule did was weaken the power of the majority and force the minority agenda as a deciding factor. This has been going on in enough institutions that the common citizen believes majority means two-thirds. (The myth is helped by the confusion in our constitution where majority of sovereign states and majority of citizens are two different entities. This gave rise to the fiasco of the 2000 election when George Bush won by a landslide of states but lost by the majority of voters who still fail to see the difference between a Republic and a Democracy.)

All of this may seem trivial until one sees how the minority can maneuver itself into a majority position and actually change the direction of history. To wit: When congress gathers to discuss legislation it sets rules of the house. One of these rules is the right to hold up legislation through long and tedious one-sided debates called filibusters.

It is a tool used successfully to stop unpopular legislation until some sort of compromise can be reached. Recently it was used, for an historic first, to stop a political appointment. Congress in its long- term wisdom decided that the best way to govern a misuse of the filibuster and get on with business was to limit them to a cloture vote. With one hundred senators a simple majority to cut off debate and vote would be 51. Since the make up of the senate is very close a rule established 60 (just shy of two-thirds) as the majority. Now, this congress has been faced with some very strong social issues and after long debate was ready to vote on raising the minimum wage, extending inheritance tax relief, and permanently reducing taxes. A quick poll indicated that 56 favored the legislation and 42 did not. A very clear majority. However, the minority who opposed the legislation mounted a filibuster and to break that a vote of 60 was needed to stop the filibuster (called cloture). By insisting that a true majority is higher than 50+1 the minority held the day and defeated the legislation. The losers? The majority? Yes, but more importantly the loser is the constitutional intent. Jonathan Katz (Wall Street Journal, August 8^th 2006) says it all. “ Rules are not sacred, Principles are.” For the sake of political grandstanding the minority has abandoned the foundation principle of our nation: the right of majority!

The American Farm Bureau has long been a champion of the true majority voice giving power to its decision making from grassroots to international debate. For further reading on FB policy refer to the publication, Your Farm Bureau. Chapter 4. What Decision by the Majority Means. A little trivia. Did you know Civics is not a required course in Rhode Island public schools?