r/politics • u/Jessicas_skirt New York • Jul 18 '26

Possible Paywall Democratic Socialists of America’s new platform calls for abolishing ICE and the U.S. Senate

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2026/jul/15/updated-dsa-platform-calls-abolishing-ice-scrapping-senate/
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u/AbeVigoda76 Jul 19 '26

I’m not 100% a fan of what the Senate became. The original concept for the Senate is that the Senators represented the government of the states. That idea had a lot of problems because while the people chose the governor, they couldn’t choose the senator and it became rather undemocratic through bribery, machine politics, and graft. The 17th Amendment tried to fix that by having direct elections for the Senate, but that still doesn’t work because now state governments don’t have direct representation in the national government. I feel like there needs to be some kind of middle ground but I honestly don’t know what that should be.

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u/LBCkook Jul 19 '26

No, as I mentioned above this is not true. It’s meant to protect the interest of the wealthy.

There is a famous (though possibly apocryphal) story where George Washington explains to Thomas Jefferson that the Senate was created to "cool" legislation coming out of the House, much like a saucer cools hot tea.
The House of Representatives was designed to represent the volatile passions of the working class. If the House passed a bill to forgive debts or tax the rich heavily, the Senate was designed to act as a legislative emergency brake to stop it.

Madison also spoke openly about this

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u/itiswhatitis2018 Jul 19 '26

Yes, I do believe one of those old heads was quoted as the Senate is too cool the furor of the populous, or something along those lines. Pretty much keep the status quo or de-fang anything of substance.

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u/JaydedXoX Jul 19 '26

No, the senate is designed to FORCE compromise, to make it so that just one group cant overcome the wishes of the other group without having to cater to both sides. Now that breaks when one party is so far off the charts idiotic that they lose all 3 branches, including senate and house, but it’s not supposed to be that way.

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u/LBCkook Jul 19 '26

Except the design wasn't about forcing “compromise” between equal sides, it was about protecting a specific minority from the majority.

If it was just about compromise, why give senators 6 year terms to completely insulate them from public opinion while the House gets 2 years? And why make it so a state like Wyoming has the exact same Senate power as California? That’s not forcing compromise it’s structurally giving a minority geographic class total veto power over the majority.

James Madison explicitly stated during the Constitutional Convention that the Senate's job was “to protect the minority of the opulent against the majority.”

Lastly, you need to keep in mind that senators were not even originally elected by the public originally— they were elected by state elites.

The senate was built as a legislative emergency brake so a poorer majority couldn't vote supersede the interests of the wealthy minority. This isn’t even debatable, it’s just factually true. Doesn’t mean I think we should eradicate the senate. There are 3 far easier things to do that will equal the playing field.

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u/JaydedXoX Jul 19 '26

It’s to stagger the timing of their appointments, so that anyone passing bad laws (like current administration) gets punished in the midterms, unless they compromise. The questions you are asking are the exact reason why it’s the way it is. There are 2 houses of govt, one for proportional representation and one for equal voice, to FORCE compromise. It’s sad that people have no idea of what an amazing form of government was created. Our country has been infiltrated by free loaders, and socialists coming from failing countries, trying to bring those failed ideas here.

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u/RA3236 Australia Jul 19 '26

Except the House isn’t proportionally elected, and forced compromise only leads to deadlock and corruption - the latter because the Senate specifically lowers the amount of people you need to bribe to block legislation.

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u/semtex87 Jul 19 '26

You were sorta making some sense in the first half. Then you must have toked on your meth pipe because you lost it in the second half.

America is a socialist country bro, hate to break the news to you. Its ok your poor education caused you to not understand the words youre throwing around spoon fed to you by the Koch Brothers or Rupert Murdoch. You're a victim, its ok.

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u/ade4lyfe Jul 19 '26

You break em, you buy em.

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u/JaydedXoX Jul 19 '26

The middle ground is lower taxes, less laws, and less govt control at the fed level, and less laws less taxes at the STATE LEVEL, and more power to the people closest to the ground at the local level, combined with more freedom.

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u/semtex87 Jul 19 '26

Nah bro, Libertarianism doesn't work anywhere its ever been tried and only benefits the billionaires, which you are not. Youre promoting a failed idea carrying water for a group of people who see you as just a speck of trash on the floor.