I have just completed reading one of the most stimulating books I've come across on procedural politics in Congress. Written by Sarah Binder of the Brookings Institute and George Washington University, it is called "Minority Rights: Majority Rule".The book describes the history of creation and suppression of minority rights, mainly in the House of Representatives. That's a fascinating story in itself. She also considers three main explanations given for the creation and suppression of minority rights - concluding from her research that the alignment of partisan preferences shapes procedural outcomes - rather than the traditional views that increased workload or increased party competition cause the changes. She finds in favour of three hypotheses -
Partisan needs hypothesis (suppression): The higher the level of minority obstructionism, the more likely the majority party will suppress minority rights.
Partisan capacity hypothesis (suppression): The stronger the majority party relative to the minority party, the more likely the majority party will suppress minority rights.
Partisan capacity hypothesis (creation): The weaker the majority party relative to the minority party, the more likely a cross-party coalition will create new minority rights.
The critical influence of 'inherited rules' on the development (or not) of rights is also considered. Sarah Binder comments "At any given time in a chamber's history, a set of inherited rules marks the contours of a legislative body...First, the set of prevailing rules affects how readily a majority party can assemble a winning coalition to secure either policy or procedural rules...Second, and relatedly, inherited rules alter the costs incurred by coalitions seeking to change the rules."
Further she considers why the Senate evolved in such a different way to the House. The early rules and practices influenced the development of a body which places greater emphasis on the rights of individual Senators. She again argues that the partisan goals of groups of Senators lie behind the developments.
The book is available from Cambridge University Press.
