Veto

[6] The institution of the veto, known to the Romans as the intercessio, was adopted by the Roman Republic in the 6th century BC to enable the tribunes to protect the mandamus interests of the plebeians (common citizenry) from the encroachments of the patricians, who dominated the Senate.

A tribune's veto did not prevent the senate from passing a bill but meant that it was denied the force of law.

[6] A notable use of the Roman veto occurred in the Gracchan land reform, which was initially spearheaded by the tribune Tiberius Gracchus in 133 BC.

Later, senators outraged by the reform murdered Gracchus and several supporters, setting off a period of internal political violence in Rome.

The concept originated in the idea of "Polish democracy" as any Pole of noble extraction was considered as good as any other, no matter how low or high his material condition might be.

The modern executive veto derives from the European institution of royal assent, in which the monarch's consent was required for bills to become law.

This in turn had evolved from earlier royal systems in which laws were simply issued by the monarch, as was the case for example in England until the reign of Edward III in the 14th century.

[8] In England itself, the power of the monarch to deny royal assent was not used after 1708, but it was used extensively in the British colonies.

[10] With the adoption of the French Constitution of 1791, King Louis XVI lost his absolute veto and acquired the power to issue a suspensive veto that could be overridden by a majority vote in two successive sessions of the Legislative Assembly, which would take four to six years.

[11] The presidential veto was conceived in by republicans in the 18th and 19th centuries as a counter-majoritarian tool, limiting the power of a legislative majority.

[12] Some republican thinkers such as Thomas Jefferson, however, argued for eliminating the veto power entirely as a relic of monarchy.

The denial of royal assent by governors in the British colonies, which continued well after the practice had ended in Britain itself, served as a check by one level of government against another.

The veto power of the ancient Roman tribunes protected the interests of one social class (the plebeians) against another (the patricians).

[21] It may also be a veto power exercised by one chamber of a bicameral legislature against another, such as was formerly held by members of the Senate of Fiji appointed by the Great Council of Chiefs.

Historically, certain European Catholic monarchs were able to veto candidates for the papacy, a power known as the jus exclusivae.

[27] However, empirical studies of the line-item veto in US state government have not found any consistent effect on the executive's ability to advance its agenda.

[29] But even a suspensory package veto that can be overridden by a simple majority can be effective in stopping or modifying legislation.

For example, in Estonia in 1993, president Lennart Meri was able to successfully obtain amendments to the proposed Law on Aliens after issuing a suspensory veto of the bill and proposing amendments based on expert opinions on European law.

[3] In parliamentary systems, the veto power of the head of state is typically weak or nonexistent.

[5] The theory of veto points was first developed by Ellen M. Immergut in 1990, in a comparative case study of healthcare reform in different political systems.

George Tsebelis first developed it in 1995 and set it forth in detail in 2002 Veto Players: How Political Institutions Work.

[140] A veto player is a political actor who has the ability to stop a change from the status quo.

[148] Some literature disagrees with the claim of veto player theory that multiparty governments are likely to be gridlocked.