Glossary on the Republic

Ratify

Union

It is the moment a deal becomes binding. A president can negotiate a treaty with the world, but it means nothing until the Senate ratifies it, and that vote takes not a majority, but two-thirds.

To ratify is to give formal, official approval that makes an agreement legally binding. For treaties, ratification is the step that turns a signed international agreement into binding law for the United States.

The Constitution splits this power deliberately. The president negotiates and signs treaties, but Article II requires the advice and consent of the Senate, and not by a simple majority: a treaty needs the approval of two-thirds of the senators present. The bar is intentionally high.

That high bar has real consequences. Because two-thirds is so hard to reach, some major international agreements the president has signed have failed in the Senate or been avoided altogether, leading presidents to use other tools, like executive agreements, that do not require ratification but lack a treaty's permanence.

Ratification also applies to the Constitution itself and its amendments, where the approval of the states, three-fourths for an amendment, is what makes the change binding. In every case, ratification is the act of consent that gives a document its force.

Origin

To give formal approval that makes an agreement binding; treaties require a two-thirds Senate vote under Article II.

Why it matters

Ratification is the constitutional check on the power to bind the nation. A president can shake hands with the world, but cannot commit the country alone; the people's representatives in the Senate must consent, and for treaties, consent broadly. It ensures that the most lasting commitments a nation makes, to other countries or to its own founding law, rest on more than one person's signature.