Posted on 04/07/2017 8:01:14 AM PDT by Kaslin
Back when I was a young staffer in the House of Representatives, we viewed the Senate with some disdain. Senators -- and more so their staffs -- were imperious. They viewed themselves as being in the higher chamber and employed arcane rules, most notoriously the filibuster, to block actions they didn't like. But I've learned a thing or two in the more than 40 years since I left my job on the House Judiciary Committee, and I've changed my mind about those Senate rules. Sometimes we need a brake, judiciously applied, to give politicians and the country the time to come together.
I was still in high school when Democrats filibustered the 1964 Civil Rights Act for 60 days, but I remember it as an ugly affair that nonetheless couldn't stop the U.S. Senate from doing what was right. In the end, the Senate mustered the votes of two-thirds of the chamber to move the landmark bill forward, but not before Sens. Robert Byrd, Strom Thurmond, Sam Ervin, Richard Russell and William Fulbright (some of whom later became liberal icons for other reasons) talked around the clock to try to kill the legislation.
As grueling as the process was, it forced debate -- and, yes, that dirty word compromise -- to enact legislation that dramatically altered the course of the country. Had liberal Democrats and Republicans who favored civil rights forced through a bill on 51 votes, the nation might never have fully embraced the changes enacted. The Supreme Court had outlawed segregation in schools in 1954, but the pace of change took decades to accomplish, in part because nine justices, even though girded by the Constitution, couldn't force the social change required. With 71 elected senators embracing the new law, the people had an easier time accepting the historic legislation. Sen. Everett Dirksen -- a Republican who helped secure passage, with larger numbers of his fellow Republicans than Democrats voting in favor -- said it best during the debate: "Stronger than all the armies is an idea whose time has come."
Much has changed since that historic day, not least of all the willingness of partisans on opposite sides to work together. The Senate changed its rule in 1975, lowering to 60 the number of votes needed to end a filibuster. On Thursday, the GOP-controlled Senate changed the rules once again -- this time disallowing a filibuster on Supreme Court nominees altogether, following the precedent set when the Democrats were in control and blocked filibusters for lower-court nominees. I am happy that the eminently qualified Neil Gorsuch will become a Supreme Court justice because of the change, but I'm troubled about what the rule change means for the future of politics in America.
Already we've seen Democrats pass the biggest piece of social legislation in 50 years on a simple party-line vote, the Affordable Care Act, by manipulating the rules that allow certain kinds of legislation to be exempt from filibuster. We're likely to see the same maneuvers if and when the GOP gets its act together to "repeal and replace" Obamacare. And of course, the Democrats' putting in place the rule allowing lower-court judges to be confirmed with less than a supermajority when the Senate was in Democratic hands means the federal courts have already become highly politicized and promise to be more so going forward. This is not a good thing, no matter which party is in control.
Ours has been a remarkably stable democracy, with control of Congress and the White House shifting back and forth election to election but the judiciary less susceptible to such swings. That was how our Founding Fathers intended it; why else make federal judges lifetime appointees? Presidents have wide latitude in making such appointments, and there's no question that judicial philosophy plays a role in whom a president chooses. But in the past, the tempering force of the old Senate rules meant few presidents risked putting forth a nominee who was outside the mainstream. President Donald Trump's nomination of Neil Gorsuch was in that tradition; Gorsuch is a mainstream judge. But Democrats, angry with Trump on a host of issues, chose to dig in their heels -- and Senate Republicans followed the Democrats' example by blowing up the remnants of the old rules.
Political majorities don't last forever, and I'm betting those on both sides of the aisle will have ample opportunity in the future to rue the day they started down this path. I'm welcoming Justice Gorsuch but saying a sorry farewell to a tradition that has helped forge consensus at difficult times.
This from the woman who wants amnesty for her illegal alien maids.
Almost anything bad can be traced to the Woodrow Wilson administration.
In my memory (since Ike) the fillibuster was mostly used by the dims and mostly to prevent integration and equal rights type legislation.
The senate rules did not include the “filibuster” at all until 1917, and the Supreme Court nominee “advise and consent” process was not subject to the 60 vote clouture rule on debate (filibuster) until 2003.
Ergo: this ain’t nothing.
It is also necessary to overcome the practical reality of a Republican party peopled by milquetoast RIno establishment types. Democrats one admirable trait is that they follow the program set forth by their leadership in lockstep. There are no moderates nor conservatives, just Democrats. Republicans are so scared of bad press and their own shadows that they can be frightened away from doing something that is reasonable and necessary. A Democrat filibuster signals to the weak sisters that this is something important and maybe they should side with the Democrats on this one, to keep their credentials as being "reasonable" and not partisan. A cloture vote gives them cover. Hogway. If it just comes to a simple vote, they will have to choose, and they know they cannot run as a Republican and vote against key Republican legislative matters and appointments.
I hate the filibuster. It has historically only been successfully used by Democrats advancing a racist or fascist agenda.
The Reid Option works for me. Democrats would use it if the shoe was on the other foot - they created it after all...
The Senate filibuster rule might have made sense at one time in our history, but I would suggest that it all started to come apart when the 17th Amendment required all states to hold direct elections for their U.S. Senators in place of whatever processes they had previously (direct elections, selection by governor, appointment by state legislature, etc.).
I think you just revealed the flaw in your own argument.
When the Dems have control, which they will someday, they will pass all manner of legislation - it's what big government types do.
The ACA repeal debacle shows that once programs takes hold - especially entitlements - it's extremely difficult to repeal the underlying legislation even with the other party in power.
It's much easier to stop legislation via the filibuster than to reverse it once in place.
So far it is only the end of cloture requiring 60 votes vice 51 votes for confirming SCOTUS justices. The confirming of justices always only required a simple majority.
BS. The Dems have nominated ideologues like Ginsburg, Sotomayor, and Kagan. Has Chavez noticed that the Dems are batting a thousand when it comes to their justices adhering to the liberal line 100% of the time, especially in the major decisions? There have been Rep-nominated justices that have turned left once on the bench.
Several decades ago linda chavez passed as a conservative but after countless open border articles, the bitch let her inner illegal overtake her American view {much like GWB}.
Stay out da bushes...what disappointment and a waste of thousands of my dollars and countless hours getting that linguine spine piece of shiY elected as pResident.
I agree . . . and disagree.
Create Obamacare, then kill it. Even the democrats won’t create it again, not with the political price they paid, the disruption, and then nothing to show in the long term. Killing this expensive and disruptive an entitlement is one of the rare times when it’s worth almost any cost.
At this point in our history, we don't need an additional brake on conservatism. The Democrat-Media complex, the GOP-e, the Deep State, and every retired (and need-to-be-retired) politician are already making the return to Constitutional governance an uphill climb.
Our President is pedaling like crazy. Let's not put on the brakes.
The Republicans never had the stones to use the filibuster properly. Strike while the iron is hot!!
Linda Chavez, rewriting history. I loathe these people.
Where is the filibuster mentioned in the Constitution?
...chirp ...chirp ...chirp
Where is the filibuster mentioned in the Constitution?
...chirp ...chirp ...chirp
The “brake” Chavez wants via the filibuster is one we already have in the Constitution. It’s called the next election, and it’s been working quite well lately.
“Had liberal Democrats and Republicans who favored civil rights forced through a bill on 51 votes, the nation might never have fully embraced the changes enacted. “
OK - that’s her main argument.
“But Democrats, angry with Trump on a host of issues, chose to dig in their heels — and Senate Republicans followed the Democrats’ example by blowing up the remnants of the old rules.”
And that’s one of the final, or concluding, remarks of her article.
I don’t know about you, but I think her conclusion as a whole negates her entire argument.
Times are different now. The Dems are no longer statesmen. They are not even grown-ups any more. Democrat voters have consistently chosen to send their peers, third-grader intellects, to Washington. Third-graders don’t care if it’s 51 or 60 votes, they scream “unfair!” and kick and scratch all the way to the “time out” corner.
Even if it were 75 votes, there would be demonstrations in the street, sparked by unhappy children protesters, having their flames fanned by stupid “leaders” (classmates) like Maxine Waters and Chuckie Schumer.
The only way to take this country back is to get a new faculty who will not put up with foolishness, and send them to a new Principal who is willing to swing the paddle with both hands, instead of “time out”. I’m tired of their spoiled rotten petulant behavior.
Hand me that paddle, will you?
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