Turning the legislative thumbscrew minority rights and procedural change in legislative politics

310 Pages·2001·19.97 MB·English

by  Dion, Douglas

Turning the Legislative Thumbscrew

Turning the
Legislative Thumbscrew
Minority Rights and Procedural
Change in Legislative Politics
DOUGLAS DION
Ann Arbor
'THE liNIvERSITr OF MIcmGAN PREss
First paperback edition 2001
Copyright © by The University of Michigan 1997
All rights reserved
Published in the United States of America by
The University of Michigan Press
Manufactured in the United States of America
e
Printed on acid-free paper
2004 2003 2002 200 1 5 4 3 2
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or
transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, or otherwise,
without the written permission of the publisher.
A CIP catalog record for this book is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Dion, Douglas, 1961-
Turning the legislative thumbscrew: minority rights and
procedural change in legislative politics I Douglas Dion.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-472-10820-4 (cloth)
I. United States. Congress-Rules and practice. 2. Parliamentary
practice-United States. 3. Legislative bodies-United States.
I. Title.
KF4937.D56 1997
342.73 '05-dc2 I 97-22819
CIP
ISBN 0-472-08826-2 (pbk. : alk. paper)
ISBN13 978-0-472-10820-6 (cloth)
ISBN13 978-0-472-08826-3 (paper)
ISBN13 978-0-472-02269-4 (electronic)
For Mary

yet behold, always as you turn your legislative thumbscrew, and will
press and even crush till Refractories give way ...
- Thomas Carlyle, The French Revolution

Contents
Preface xi
Acknowledgments xvii
Part 1. Minority Rights in Legislatures
Chapter 1. Introduction 3
Chapter 2. A Partisan Theory of Obstruction
and Procedural Change 21
Part 2. Evidence from the U.S. House, 1837-95
Chapter 3. Testing Assumptions and Links 41
Chapter 4. Rules Changes in the Antebellum House 79
Chapter 5. Rules Changes in the Gilded Age 105
Chapter 6. The Missing Rules Changes 139
Part 3. Evidence from Other Institutions
Chapter 7. The U.S. Senate 165
Chapter 8. Going Abroad: The House of Commons
and the Austrian Parliament 189
Part 4. Conclusion
Chapter 9. Final Thoughts 245
Notes 259
Bibliography 277
Index 289