Cord Byrd: “I thank the Chair. In my continuing series of statements on the idea of a Senate, I refer today to the necessity of the…”

“I thank the Chair. In my continuing series of statements on the idea of a Senate, I refer today to the necessity of the Senate in the Federal Government by James Madison in the Federalist 62, 1787. Was the Senate really necessary? Was a Senate really necessary? Since the American Revolution, the United States had operated under a single body legislature, but the Framers of the Constitution created both a Senate and a House of Representatives. Writing in the Federalist Papers, a collection of 85 letters, written to newspapers in support of the Constitution's ratification, James Madison explained the unique nature of the Senate and the cautious deliberative role that it would play in the American Government. Federalist 62: The qualifications proposed for senators, as distinguished from those of representatives, consists in a more advanced age and a longer period of citizenship. . . . The propriety of these distinctions is explained by the nature of the senatorial trust, which, requiring greater extent of information and stability of character, requires at the same time, that the senator should have reached a period of life most likely to supply these advantages . . . It is equally unnecessary to dilate on the appointment of senators by the State legislatures. . . . It is recommended by the double advantage of favoring a select appointment, and of giving to the State governments such an agency in the formation of the federal government. . . .…”