But then that statute can be repealed or simply pass a subsequent statute that conflicts with it. The constitutional process to pass a statute cannot be changed -- by statute because a subsequently passed statute that conflicts takes precedence.
Nice editing down, but what I said was:
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Or both together.
Plus, and I'm not sure this would fly since I never really had cause to think about it before, but after doing those two they could then try to pass legislation requiring that judicial confirmations and changes to the court's size must be pass by sixty votes, not a simple majority (or 64, once DC/PR are in), ie, to take a now-eroded
senate rule* and turn it into something required by statute.
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*And, you might wonder why there's a 60-vote rule in the Senate, when it just takes a straight majority in the House to pass a bill. The answer is that that's what the Founders intended. The Senate was designed to be the "cooling saucer," where the two parties were forced to work together. That 60-vote threshold ensures that in order to pass legislation, the majority party needs to get some buy-in from the minority. However, that has been eroding. Back in 2013, Democrats, who at the time controlled the Senate, were so frustrated by the slow pace of confirmation of then-President Obama's nominees that they pulled the trigger on what was known as the "nuclear option." This essentially changed the rules in the Senate and busted the 60-vote threshold down to a simple majority of 51 votes for presidential nominees only. Fast-forward to 2017, when Republicans chipped a little more away from the 60-vote requirement when they said that Supreme Court nominees would also only need 51 votes to be confirmed.
CBS News chief congressional correspondent Nancy Cordes explains why that is and how senators have found ways around the rule
www.cbsnews.com
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You don't point to any provision in the constitution that says
"The constitutional process to pass a statute cannot be changed -- by statute because a subsequently passed statute that conflicts takes precedence." You just..say it. Is there some provision I'm not aware of explicitly stating that laws pass by a simple majority? Because I didn't see that. I suspect if you look you'll only find an explicit vote requirement when it comes to overriding a video, which it says
two thirds. Otherwise, it just generally refers to things passing. It doesn't say things pass by a majority no matter what full stop.
I'm not aware of anything that says they could not first expand the court with a simple majority, then pass a law saying all future legislative changes to the court's make up require a supermajority, and that the law saying so itself cannot be repealed without a supermajority.
It's not like they have not done this before. What do you think the rules around filibusters and a requirement of 60 votes to break one did? That artificially raised the floor from 51 votes to 60. There's no reason a statute can't do what a mere rule did. And a statute would have a lot more staying power than a rule.