Summary of Adam Jentleson's Kill Switch

Everest Media

Description

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book.
Sample Book Insights:
#1 I see a broken man when I think about my time in the Senate. I was standing in the inner office of the Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, who had led the charge to pass universal background checks. But four months earlier, his six-year-old son had been shot dead in his first-grade classroom.
#2 The support of a broad, bipartisan majority of senators and the American public was not enough to pass the background-checks bill. Its opponents used a twentieth-century rule that was invented to curtail obstruction by ending the type of marathon filibusters that many people picture when they think of the Senate.
#3 The vote deciding the bill’s fate had taken place shortly before we found ourselves in Reid’s office, standing around in silence. As reporters filed their stories in the press gallery one floor above, we waited for Neil to speak.
#4 The republic, not a democracy argument is based on a semantic twist. When the Framers wrote the Constitution, the word democracy meant direct democracy, which was the kind practiced in ancient Greece.

Sujets

• American Government
• Legislature

Informations

• Publié par: Everest Media LLC
• Date de parution: 13 mars 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781669352945
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

Insights on Adam Jentleson's Kill Switch
Contents Insights from Chapter 1 Insights from Chapter 2 Insights from Chapter 3
Insights from Chapter 1

#1

I see a broken man when I think about my time in the Senate. I was standing in the inner office of the Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, who had led the charge to pass universal background checks. But four months earlier, his six-year-old son had been shot dead in his first-grade classroom.

#2

The support of a broad, bipartisan majority of senators and the American public was not enough to pass the background-checks bill. Its opponents used a twentieth-century rule that was invented to curtail obstruction by ending the type of marathon filibusters that many people picture when they think of the Senate.

#3

The vote deciding the bill’s fate had taken place shortly before we found ourselves in Reid’s office, standing around in silence. As reporters filed their stories in the press gallery one floor above, we waited for Neil to speak.

#4

The republic, not a democracy argument is based on a semantic twist. When the Framers wrote the Constitution, the word democracy meant direct democracy, which was the kind practiced in ancient Greece.

#5

The Framers were well aware of the arguments in favor of supermajorities, such as the theory that they promote consensus. But they had seen firsthand that such theories do not match reality.

#6

Madison was the man who drafted the Constitution, and he was also the man who was most concerned with the balance between majority rule and minority protections. He believed that majority rule was the best available system, aside from a few exceptions.

#7

Madison argued that the small states were being obstinate, and that the convention should decide based on population. He believed that the majority should rule, and that the smaller states would come around because they had no other choice.

#8

The small states, led by Virginia, argued that majority rule should be used to decide issues concerning interstate commerce and the navigation of waterways. They were firmly rejected. The delegates instead decided that the Senate should be a strictly majority-rule institution.

#9

When it came time to sell the Constitution to the American people, the Framers made majority rule central to their argument. If a minority was allowed to block a majority, then in all cases where justice or the general good might require new laws or active measures, the fundamental principle of free government would be reversed.

#10

While Madison did believe that the American system was susceptible to being abused by a majority, he argued that it was still the best balance between majority rule and minority protections.

#11

The Senate was designed to be a deliberative body, and to protect against the whims of majority mobs. However, it is the system as a whole that provides the minority with protections.

#12

Calhoun was a unionist during the War of 1812, and a leading war hawk. He was also an ardent advocate of federal power. He ran for president in 1824, but did not win.

#13

Calhoun’s bitterness towards Adams would lead to the South Carolina senator writing a pair of manifestos that would become known as Exposition and Protest. These manifestos outlined the theory of nullification, which stated that states could call individual conventions to examine the constitutionality of specific federal laws.

#14

Calhoun’s career was defined by his doctrine of nullification, which was the idea that a minority could veto the will of the majority. It was met with great opposition from Senator Daniel Webster of Massachusetts.

#15

In 1830, Webster turned a floor debate over the sale of western lands into an attack on nullification. The vice-president is the president of the Senate, and at the time would preside over the chamber most days. On this day, Calhoun was sitting in the presider’s chair when Webster launched his attack.

#16

Calhoun, like future generations of conservatives, invoked Madison in defense of his ideas during the nullification crisis. But instead of using Madison’s resolution to declare the Alien and Sedition Acts unconstitutional, Calhoun used it to claim that the Constitution had been violated by the Act.

#17

While Madison did not support the idea of nullification, he did believe that the system worked, and that it was the best that could be done. He advised minorities to trust the system, and work through the process to address their grievances.

#18

Madison’s vision of minority rule seemed to win out in his time, but Calhoun, and his vision of minority rule, would outlive him.

#19

The filibuster did not exist in the framers’ time, and they would have opposed it. The idea of unlimited debate today is divorced from reality. To witness the use of the phrase today, take a look at the debate that led to the defeat of the background-checks bill in 2013.

#20

The debate on the background checks bill was the most obvious example of how the minority can use the principle of unlimited debate to force the majority to go along with their policies.

#21

The Senate’s original rules, which were established in 1789, encouraged extensive, thoughtful debate, but provided senators with tools to rein it in if the debate became obstructive. The most consequential of these rules was the previous question rule, which allowed senators to wrap up debate and move to the final vote that would decide the fate of the bill.

#22

The Senate got rid of the previous question motion in 1806, at the suggestion of Vice-President Aaron Burr.