Posted on 03/16/2005 5:13:03 AM PST by vastwritewingconspiracy
Time to Bust the Filibusters by Gary Schneeberger, editor
The blockade of President Bush's judicial nominations is wrong — and the Democrats know it.
The way liberal senators like Robert Byrd and Ted Kennedy have talked of late, you'd think the Constitution guaranteed them the right to twist Senate rules to block President Bush's judicial nominees.
The reality, though, is that no article, section, amendment — or stray sentence — in our nation's founding document authorizes the Senate's Democratic minority to abuse filibusters as they have for the past four years: as a means of keeping those with whom they disagree ideologically from serving on the federal bench.
Byrd, Kennedy & Co. know this, of course, despite their furrowed-brow pontificating in recent weeks about how democracy itself would be threatened if their Republican colleagues opt to change the Senate's rules regarding filibusters of judicial nominees. How do we know they know it? Because they said so, back before it served their agenda to pretend there was something sacrosanct about exploiting parliamentary procedure to prevent full chamber votes on — and certain confirmation of — the nominations of 10 social conservatives bound for federal appeals courts.
"I have stated this over and over again on this floor . . . that I would object and fight against any filibuster on a judge, whether it was somebody I opposed or supported," Vermont Democrat Patrick Leahy said in 1998. "If we don't like somebody the president nominates, vote him or her down. But don't hold them in this anonymous unconscionable limbo, because in doing that, the minority of senators really shame all senators."
Others now leading the filibuster charge have said similar things, whether it's Illinois' Richard Durbin noting in 1997 that holding up judicial nominations "does a great disservice to this country," or California's Dianne Feinstein acknowledging in 1999 that allowing an up-or-down vote on a nominee "is the honest thing to do."
It is also the constitutional thing to do. The legal requirement for confirming judges is a simple majority vote (51 of 100 senators), not a supermajority vote (60, the number currently required to end a filibuster). Prior to 2001, in fact, every judicial nominee who was supported by a simple majority of senators was confirmed, including 10 who received fewer than 60 votes.
It is for this reason that Republican leadership is contemplating restorign the threshhold for ending a filibuster on judicial nominees to 51 votes. Big media — dutifully fulfilling its role as the political left's No. 1 ally — has dubbed such action the "nuclear option," but there is nothing "nuclear" about it. Our founding fathers didn't employ filibusters at all, and there are at least 26 laws on the books today limiting their use in certain situations, such as during consideration of a federal budget resolution or an international trade agreement.
More to the point, though, a majority of senators has always had the constitutional authority, under Article I, to establish the standing rules of the Senate. In fact, Sen. Byrd, widely hailed as the chamber's fount of all knowledge on procedures and traditions, led the charge to establish new Senate precedents in 1977, 1979, 1980 and 1987 — including many designed specifically to stop filibusters and other minority-party stall tactics.
Even Sen. Kennedy seemed to realize all of this — back in 1975.
"The filibuster rule is not enshrined in the Constitution," he noted then. "Instead, it is a rule that was made by the Senate, and it is a rule that can be unmade by the Senate."
It is a rule that should be unmade by the Senate. The GOP majority has put up with far too much obstruction, for far too long; the time is now, before a vacancy opens up on the Supreme Court, to stop these purveyors of liberalism — increasingly rebuffed at the ballot box — from hijacking the rule of law to impose their agenda on our nation the only way they still can: through judicial fiat.
As New York Democrat Charles Schumer has so eloquently noted:
"This delay makes a mockery of the Constitution, makes a mockery of the fact that we are here working, and makes a mockery of the lives of very sincere people who have put themselves forward to be judges -- and then they hang out there in limbo."
FYI, I'm pinging you on a related thread..regards..
The heart of the article, in my opinion.
According to the Constitution, Senate Rules can be rewritten every time we have a new Senate. Rewriting the filibuster rule has been done a huge number of times previously....as noted above there are already 26 laws (rule modifications) limiting how the filibuster can be used.
This is simply one more constitutional limitation of a rule that doesn't even have to exist at all because it is NOT in the constitution anyplace. It's simply a self-imposed rule by a bunch of rich guy senators who like to hear themselves bloviate endlessly on how many homeless welfare clients can dance on the head of a pin.
It's a CONSTITUTIONAL option.
Great, but Freepers know this stuff. Somebody needs to tell Bill Frist to grow a pair and get the minority party away from the podium. It's his show now. Tell Fat Boy and Byrd -brain to sit down, and shut up.
I'd like to be able to read those "26" laws. ...
There's alot of banter going on regarding the issue of the "filibuster" as it pertains to judges, but I feel like the ongoing discussion rarely touches on just who decreed that a supermajority was required. When did this begin? under Daschle?
I'd really appreciate someone pointing me to articles that cover the beginnings of the judicial filibuster that explain the "who, what, where, and why" of the situation in which we find ourselves.
Thanks
There is a Rat hue and cry being raised. This can only mean that Frist finally has the votes.
Social Security will be saved and then the Judges will be confirmed, all of them.
There will be wailing and agony on the Rat side of the aisle.
The filibuster is merely a Senate Rule.
The Constitution says a few things of interest to this discussion:
1. The Senate is required by the Constitution to advise and consent on the President's appointments to the judiciary and a few other offices. That's all it says.
2. The Constitution also says that the Senate can make its own rules. It can make a rule for anything it wants from "the time the doors are opened" to "who takes out the trash" to "how long debate is allowed to continue." They made a rule that says that debate can go on as long as any member wants it to UNLESS 60% of the Senators vote to close down that particular debate. (Cloture rule.)
3. The Constitution does not use the word filibuster or cloture even once.
4. Every Senate is a newly elected body that gets to establish its own rules. If they were automatically bound by unchangeable old rules, then those rules would be more powerful than the Constitution itself.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/856725/posts?page=4#4
Thanks for this post, the quotes are priceless. Funny how the Rats claim they want every vote counted but then disregard those votes i.e. the will of the people in electing a majority. Forget the Constitution they swore to uphold. Tell them what you think. The link below has a list of Senators: e-mail and phone #'s.
www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm
'Hypocrisy of the Democrats'
Isn't that an oxymoron?
Dirty Harry Reid also noted he needed one more vote to stop ANWAR. I doubt his numbers.
No it is a redundancy.
"Honesty of the democrats" is an oxymoron.
Nuclear Option? I'll believe it when I see it....heard that blowhard Trent Lott on Hannity yesterday hemmin' n' hawin' just like he has been doing for the last 6 years. They are so scared of becoming the minority it ain't ever gonna happen.
If my memory serves me correctly no presently serving Democratic senator was elected by 100%, do the minority voters in those states represented by one or more Democratic senators have "minority voices"?
thanks for the info and link.
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