Here is some recent history, via Wikipedia:
The majority of the majority is a governing principle (not a legal procedure) used by Republican Speakers of the House of Representatives since the mid-1990s to effectively limit the power of the minority party to bring bills up for a vote on the floor of the house.[1] Under the majority of the majority doctrine the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives will not allow a vote on a bill to take place unless the majority of the majority party supports the bill.[2] This is sometimes referred to as the “Hastert Rule”,[3] as its introduction is widely credited to former Speaker Dennis Hastert (1999-2007); however, Newt Gingrich, who directly preceded Hastert as Speaker (1995-1999), followed the same rule.[4] Hastert was vocal in his support of the rule stating that his job was “to please the majority of the majority.”[5]
Within the next hour, we may see Speaker John Boehner violate the Hastert Rule for the first time. In a parliamentary system, this would never happen. What would happen instead is that the parliament would express “no confidence” in their prime minister and a new coalition would elect a new prime minister. We don’t have a parliamentary system, but our system has been behaving like one since the Republican Revolution of 1994. Getting Boehner to behave like a Speaker of the House rather than merely the leader of its largest faction is a major accomplishment. It may cost him his gavel, but more likely it will save it. House members will need to be slowly house-trained to give up some of their delusions and bad habits if this country is going to be governable over the next years. The reason is simple: the majority of the House Republicans are stark-raving mad.
