Praise for 60% status quo

How we protect the minority demonstrates our success as a society. Our Founding Fathers were aware that mob rule would be unsuccessful as a long-standing form of government. Likewise, our form of bicameral legislature and Electoral College ensure that a few large states cannot en masse impose their will on the smaller states.

These issues typically arise in every presidential election, in the rules of the U.S. Senate (which has abolished the filibuster in many instances, to its detriment), and even here in Florida, which requires a 60% threshold for passing amendments to the state Constitution. Undoubtedly, this increased threshold requires that people of different perspectives (and/or political parties) mutually agree on these amendments. Columnist Steve Bousquet correctly reflects that the will of a supermajority (more than 66.6%) of voters was achieved in the passage of the medical marijuana act, and just over 60% in the passage of the increase in minimum wage [“Why ‘Black Flag dead’ is a good thing in Tallahassee | Steve Bousquet,” Dec. 11]. But to suggest that the 60% threshold is too high because the minimum wage increase “barely” passed, frankly, misses the point. That said, discussions of increasing the threshold to two-thirds (from 60%), or this year’s failed ballot initiative to require two successive ballot initiatives for a constitutional amendment to pass, take the argument to an opposite, radical extreme, and it was proper for such initiatives to fail.

Protecting minority interests in voting — in legislatures, in amendment thresholds and in society — is not a notion to be dismissed when it’s politically convenient; indeed, it is the foundation for the very success of our principled democracy and should be revered. As we can see through Florida’s own requirements, successful ballot initiatives and failed proposals, a measure of balance, reasonableness and dare I say (in this hyper-charged environment) common sense, are required to preserve fairness and equity for all.

Marc Wigder, Boca Raton