Posted on 01/27/2022 9:31:35 AM PST by SeekAndFind
Senate Democrats recently renewed their effort to eliminate or change the U.S. Senate’s filibuster, one of America’s most enduring legislative traditions.
They’ve attempted to sanitize their plan by calling it “reform,” but it’s increasingly clear that their real intent is far more insidious: to bulldoze a key Senate procedure so they can quickly push through their agenda without having to compromise with the minority party. In other words, it’s another brazen attempt to grab more political power.
People of faith in America, please heed this warning: Your religious liberty could be in grave danger if the party in power succeeds at changing the Senate rules. The filibuster is an essential part of our legislative process — a necessary guardrail that protects our God-given rights from being taken away at a moment’s notice.
The Founders designed the Senate to be more deliberative and to move more slowly than the House of Representatives. The filibuster rule used to lead to extended sessions of speech-making, prolonging debate in an effort to delay or stop a bill from moving forward. In more recent times, the Senate decided to keep the process moving by requiring a 60-vote majority to end debate and bring a bill to a final up-or-down-vote. Democrats want to change that threshold to a simple majority.
If the filibuster is “reformed,” it would destroy the Founders’ vision for the Senate and could open the floodgates to far-reaching legislation, policies and even radical changes to the Constitution.
The filibuster in the Senate is a tried-and-true tradition that forces moderation and compromise. Without it, there would be no check on the majority party to push through massive change with little reflection.
This was the original intent of the Constitution’s Framers, who created the Senate to differ from the majoritarian rule and popular impulses of the U.S. House of Representatives. The Senate was designed to be a deliberative body, where prudence, procedure and prolonged debate would, at times, be the safeguard against radical political forces that want their way no matter what.
Eliminating the filibuster creates an imbalance in the legislative process. But that would only be the first domino to topple.
Once the filibuster is gone, other destructive measures would likely surface soon after — such as court-packing. This is perhaps one of the most threatening to the Constitution’s separation of powers, as it would destroy judicial independence.
It’s no secret the party in power is seeking to “reform” the Supreme Court by stacking it with liberal judges who will rubber stamp their political agenda. Last year, they introduced legislation to expand the size of the Court by adding four seats.
Their scheme, however, has since hit a major roadblock: the voice of the American people. A vast majority of Americans (68%) oppose court-packing. What’s more, President Biden’s Supreme Court Commission didn’t embrace the idea of expanding the nations’ highest court.
This doesn’t mean court-packing is off the table or that it’s not a threat anymore. Getting rid of the filibuster is still a viable path — perhaps the only path — for the far Left to reach their court-tilting goal.
Ending the filibuster would also open the door wide for far-reaching legislation currently pending in Congress, including the “Equality” Act — a proposed law that would eviscerate federal religious freedom protections and demand that millions of people of faith violate their conscience and conform to a political ideology.
Take the filibuster out of the equation, and the majority party in the Senate would likely only have to gather a simple majority (51 votes) to move such extremist measures closer to becoming law.
At the heart of the ongoing debate to end the filibuster is really a deeper question about liberty and the role of government in Americans’ everyday lives.
Opponents slander the filibuster as a nuisance of parliamentary procedure. Yes, the filibuster is an institutional norm, but it is crucial in protecting our constitutional rights, including religious freedom. It’s essential in shielding Americans from government elites who wish to strong-arm citizens into conforming to a particular ideology.
The need for the filibuster as a check on one-party rule is all the more necessary today, especially for people of faith whose views and beliefs may be considered unpopular or run contrary to the Left’s cultural orthodoxy on sexuality, marriage, life or other essential issues.
If religious Americans are now perceived to be in the cultural and political minority, then the filibuster does indeed serve a priceless purpose. Senators who value and cherish religious freedom have a tool in their legislative arsenal to ensure a tyrannical majority does not impose its will or strip away legal protections from houses of worship and people of faith.
America’s Constitution and the Bill of Rights are distinct and exceptional because of their continuity, particularly the eternal truth that our God-given rights and freedoms do not — and should not — change based on the whims of whomever controls political power. The filibuster helps preserve that continuity so that our rights aren’t changed — or worse, erased — at a moment’s notice.
Bottom line, America needs the filibuster. It’s one of our most essential procedural guardrails in preventing oppressive majority rule and our country going off the deep-end into radicalism — or outright tyranny.
repeal 17th
Already there.....we are a Banana Republic.....with NO DAMN BANANAS!
The Democrats this past year have made clear their hatred for the Senate and we’ve heard them make various proposals to eradicate the lingering power of the states as represented in the Senate by:
1. Abolishing the Senate entirely.
2. Apportioning Senate seats into districts that span state borders.
3. Combining the 100 Senate seats into the House of Representatives.
Tearing away the foundational traditions of the Senate paves the way to accomplish the leftist goals of diminishing the various states into Federal provinces that will be ruled from Washington by one and only one party.
Oh, the people in the deep state running DC and blue/RINO states are plenty bananas.
Instead of doing away with the filibuster just return it to the days when the Senator had to actually hold the floor in order to filibuster instead of just phoning it in.
in hindsight after setting it up, it should of taken 60% to pass new laws. If you can’t get 60% support of an idea, there is no reason to make it a law IMO
Our Founding Fathers designed a slow inefficient government.
WE DO NOT WANT AN EFFICIENT GOVERNMENT!
Militia issues aside, the main type of domestic policy bills that the Senate should be filibustering are bills dealing with the US Post Office imo.
"Article I, Section 8, Clause 7: To establish Post Offices and post Roads;"More specifically, most of the bills that the very corrupt, post-17th Amendment ratification Senate is now helping the likewise corrupt House to pass are based on stolen state powers which the delegates to the Constitutional Convention had intended for the Senate to kill.
"10th Amendment: The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."
”From the accepted doctrine that the United States is a government of delegated powers, it follows that those not expressly granted, or reasonably to be implied from such as are conferred, are reserved to the states, or to the people. To forestall any suggestion to the contrary, the Tenth Amendment was adopted. The same proposition, otherwise stated, is that powers not granted are prohibited [emphasis added].” —United States v. Butler, 1936.
Insights welcome.
The ultimate remedy for unconstitutionally big, alleged election-stealing, Democratic Party-pirated federal and state governments, allegedly manufacturing crises to oppress everybody under their boots...
Consider that the states effectively have "veto power" over continued unpopular, unconstitutional actions of the feds.
More specifically, all the states can effectively “secede” from the unconstitutionally big federal government by doing the following.
Patriots need to primary federal and state elected officials who don't send voters email ASAP that clearly promises to do the following.
Federal and state lawmakers need to promise in their emails to introduce resolutions no later than 100 days after start of new legislative sessions that proposes an amendment to the Constitution to the states, the amendment limited to repealing the 16th and ill-conceived 17th Amendments (16&17A), little or no discussion required imo.
In fact, I challenge the states to ram the repeal amendment for 16&17A through the ratification process faster than Nancy Pelosi irresponsibly rammed unconstitutional Obamacare through the House. /semi-sarc
Again, insights welcome.
BS!
The country has been on a long descent into tyranny for many decades...
Where has Jorge been hiding or sleeping all these years?
He is just another typical frog who finally notices the boiling water...
That’s the point.
“The filibuster protects freedoms and rights for Americans in the minority”
I suspect that the original understanding of “minority rights” pertained to political minorities, not skin color, ethnicity, sexual orientation, etc. Underlying that understanding is the recognition that rule by the majority without protection of the minority is a form of tyranny. But that understanding has been so twisted over the past century, that “minority rights” now mean the opposite.
The Trillion dollar question is why didn't the Democrats seize permanent power under Obama's rule?
Bkmk
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