Tyranny of the Minority: Why American Democracy Reached the Breaking Point

Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 2023

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Introduction

Chapters 1-2

Chapters 3-4

Chapters 5-6

Chapters 7-8

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Themes

The Antiquated Elements of American Democracy

One of the key goals of Tyranny of Minority is to sound the alarm on the antiquated elements of American democracy. The authors outline 8 counter-majoritarian institutions, which they believe are hindering American democracy. Most of these institutions—except the judicial review and filibuster—were created at the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia in 1787. The Bill of Rights represents the first. This institution is much less dangerous than the others since it does protect democracy. However, the individual liberties enshrined in the Bill of Rights are often poorly-defined and unevenly protected.

The second is the lifetime appointments of Supreme Court justices. When there are no restrictions on term appointments or retirement age, justices often lose touch with the majority. They were elected during a different time and are unable to evolve their judicial thinking to match the present day.

Federalism, which favors lawmaking power by states and local governments over the federal government, represents the third. Most state legislatures have a winner-take-all system. This makes state legislatures prone to minority rule.

A bicameral Congress where legislative majorities in both the House and Senate are required to pass laws is the fourth. This type of system should prevent one party from gaining too much power, yet this is not the case. Due to the weaknesses in other American institutions, the Republican Party can now more easily control both the House and Senate than the Democratic Party.

The fifth is the malapportioned Senate, where states are given the same number of representatives regardless of population. Smaller states have the exact same representation as larger states. The authors note that “sparsely populated states representing less than 20 percent of the US population can produce a Senate majority. And states representing 11 percent of the population can produce enough votes to block legislation via a filibuster” (175).

Filibusters represent the sixth. It empowers legislators from the minority power to stop legislation from coming to a vote. Many view the filibuster as an essential minority right, including President Lyndon Johnson, but the authors argue that it has been abused in recent years.

The Electoral College is the seventh. The Founding Fathers debated on the issue of how to select a US president for 21 days and held 30 votes. Delegates at the convention adopted the Electoral College only after all other ideas were rejected. The Electoral College was less contentious than the other ideas because it provided advantages to less-populous and southern states. Alexander Hamilton and other Founding Fathers believed the Electoral College would be “composed of highly qualified notables, or prominent elites, chosen by state legislators, who would act independently” (158). This notion never came to fruition. The authors note that “the electoral college immediately became an arena of party competition. As early as 1796, electors acted as strictly partisan representatives” (158). This has continued today.

Finally, the extreme supermajority required for constitutional amendments is the last counter-majoritarian institution. This institution has blocked the approval of laws favored by the majority of Americans, including protecting abortion rights, gun control, and reducing poverty and inequality.

There are three main reasons why these elements still exist. First, the Founding Fathers recognized that it is important for democracies to include rules that limit the power of majorities. Majority rule can be dangerous to democracies, as is the case with Viktor Orbán and Benjamin Netanyahu’s governments in Hungary and Israel, respectively. Thus, there does need to be checks in place for majority rule. Second, Americans uniquely hold their founding institutions on a pedestal, which makes reforms exceedingly difficult. Finally, the Republican Party has benefited from these antiquated elements, making them resistant to reforms (see The Changing Nature of the Republican Party below). The authors believe that the US is at a crossroads: There is still time to reform these antiquated elements before Americans descend fully into minority rule, but Americans must act soon, or their democracy will slip away from them.

The Importance of Reform

The authors detail The Antiquated Elements of American Democracy so they can fulfill their second goal: to show how US citizens can reform American democracy to make it more robust. The authors first explore two short-term strategies. First, they suggest that democratic-minded forces can create a broad coalition to ostracize and defeat authoritarian extremists. Some American politicians tried this strategy during the Trump years. They formed organizations like Republican Voters Against Trump and the Lincoln Project and cooperated with Democrats to defeat Trump in the 2020 election. Representatives Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger also worked alongside Democrats on the House Select Committee to investigate the US Capitol attack on January 6th, 2021. Both were conservative Republicans. While containment is important, it has not stopped Donald Trump’s influence on the Republican Party or the radicalization of Republican constituents.

Second, Levitsky and Ziblatt explore militant or defensive democracy, where governments prosecute antidemocratic forces. The US is trying to prosecute Americans who took part in the January 6th attack on the US Capitol. However, Republican leaders have tried to defend these individuals as patriots. This strategy is also prone to abuse, which has been the case at several points in American history, including the intentional prosecution and killing of African American activists and leaders.

Recognizing that containment and militant or defensive democracy are short-term strategies, the authors turn to reforming political institutions as the most important strategy. They outline 15 steps that fall within three broad areas of reform. The first area is to uphold voting rights. The authors propose seven steps. First, Americans need to pass a constitutional amendment that recognizes all Americans’ right to suffrage. This would make litigating voting restrictions much easier. Second, the US should automatically register all citizens to vote when they turn 18 years old and give them an accompanying national voting ID card. Third, voting needs to become easier, including by expanding mail-in voting and early voting. Fourth, Election Day should either be a national holiday or take place on a Sunday so Americans can vote regardless of work responsibilities. Fifth, voting rights should be restored to ex-felons. Sixth, voting rights protections need to be restored at the national level after the Supreme Court gut parts of the 1965 Voting Rights Act in 2013. Finally, non-partisan, professional officials should manage state and local electoral administration, ensuring fairness.

The second area is to ensure that election outcomes represent majority preferences. The authors propose five steps here. First, the national popular vote should replace the Electoral College. There is no other democracy in the world where presidential candidates win despite losing the popular vote. Second, representation in the Senate should be more proportional to a state’s population. Third, the authors advocate replacing the winner-take-all system seen in the House of Representatives and state legislators. Fourth, all states should create independent redistricting commissions to replace the partisan gerrymandering. Finally, the House needs to return to its original design of expanding as population grows, which means updating the Apportionment Act of 1929.

Empowering governing majorities represents the final category. Levitsky and Ziblatt suggest three steps. First, they strongly advocate for the abolishment of the Senate filibuster. Second, they recommend establishing term limits and a retirement age for Supreme Court justices. Finally, the two-thirds supermajorities in both the House and Senate need to be abolished, making it easier to amend the Constitution.

For the authors, the purpose of these reforms is to “compel Republicans to build broader coalitions in order to win. In America today, these coalitions would necessarily be more diverse, which would dilute the influence of the most extremist elements in the Republican party” (236). Levitsky and Ziblatt recognize that these reforms might take time. To them, it is more important that Americans get involved in public discourse and civic activism. Not only will political leaders be unable to ignore the masses, but Americans can collectively help design a more inclusive and multiracial democracy.

The Changing Nature of the Republican Party

Levitsky and Ziblatt discuss how semi-loyal democrats took over the Republican Party, which once defended diversity and democracy during the Reconstruction era. First, the Republican Party began to lose elections starting in the 1930s. Prior to this time, Republicans dominated national politics. However, urban working-class voters rejected the Republican Party and turned to the Democratic Party. As a result, the Democratic Party won five consecutive presidential elections.

The Republican Party feared they were “becoming a ‘permanent minority’” (95). They looked for new constituents, turning to “‘white southerners who felt alienated from, angry at, and resentful of the policies that granted equality and sought to level the playing field for [minority] groups” (97). White southerners turned away from the Democratic Party who began to include civil rights in its political platform.

Republican strategists continued focusing on creating “’the White Man’s Party’” (97). By the early 2000s, the focus on racial conservatism paid off. The Republican party solidified their white, primarily rural, and Christian constituency, known as the “Great White Switch.” This Great White Switch also created a monster. Republican voters now scored high on racial resentment. Republican leaders and conservative media pundits fueled white conservative Americans’ fears about losing their place in society. This perceived existential threat captured the Republican Party, enabling extremists to take over.

The authors argue that some Republican leaders also care more about their careers than democracy. The refusal of the US Senate to confirm President Barack Obama’s appointment of Merrick Garland after the death of Justice Antonin Scalia in 2016 represents one example. The US Constitution states that Supreme Court nominations must have the consent of the Senate. Prior to 2016, the Senate exercised this power with forbearance. They generally approved qualified nominees. Between 1866-2016, the Senate never prevented a sitting president from filling a Supreme Court vacancy. In March 2016, however, Senate Republicans refused to hold hearings because it was an election year.

In the end, Trump filled the seat. Technically, this refusal was legal since the US Constitution does not state when the Senate must confirm presidential Supreme Court nominees. However, Senate Republicans went against decades of norms, violating the spirit of the Constitution. This decision paved the way for Trump to nominate several more Supreme Court justices, tipping the balance of the court towards conservatives. These conservative justices have reinterpreted standing laws, such as Roe VS Wade, giving the impression of a biased and out-of-touch Supreme Court, which further imperils American democracy.

Another example is how the Republican leadership and party acted in the aftermath of the 2020 election and the January 6th, 2021 attack on the US Capitol. They violated all three basic principles of loyal democrats. First, many refused to accept the election results in 2020. Parties must be able to lose and then regroup in democracies. The Republican Party has lost this ability. Second, Republican leaders, including Trump, did not denounce the violence that occurred during the US Capitol attack. Republican leaders are also increasingly using violent rhetoric and appearing with weapons in their campaign ads. Finally, many Republican leaders, like Mitch McConnell and Kevin McCarthy, did not denounce the extremists within their own ranks, particularly when it became clear that Republican voters remained loyal to Trump. The authors thus argue that extremist elements have taken over the Republican party, which in turn threatens the workings of American democracy.