The Role of the Minority Party

In Congress the role of the minority is to help the majority party shape public policy. While majority rules in Congress the minority still can develop influence. Outside of Congress the minority party must work to gather and unite its members so that the party is strengthened. The idea is party power.
The minority also must work for the support of the majority party. The key here is BIPARTISANSHIP!!! I’m not saying that the majority party is going to just go ahead and give power to the minority, but the minority will try to get some of the members of the majority to see their side of the story on issues. This is what happened to Nancy Pelosi. A side from her being the first woman speaker of the House she exercised her minority party power and persuaded the majority to vote with some issues that would have gone the other way if there wouldn’t have bipartisanship.
Another characteristic that the minority needs to have besides uniting members of the party is to be aggressive. Nancy Pelosi was aggressive and pushed forth many issues of the minority party. This helped her gain more support not only from her party, but also gained the support of the majority party on legislature that was important to both parties.
The calling for bipartisanship is and will continue to be something that will always happen in Congress. As we talked about there will not be a median voter, there will not be median party either. There will be continued turmoil in Congress and especially among the majority and minority parties.