The Chris Moeller Archives

Out with the filibuster

Iowa Senator Tom Harkin has begun hinting again that he may introduce legislation ending the practice of filibustering in that legislative body. "I think, if anything, this health care debate is showing the dangers of unlimited filibuster," he told reporters. "I think there's a reason for slowing things down... and getting the public aware of what's happening and maybe even to change public sentiment, but not to just absolutely stop something."

That's a confusing statement, and it would appear to be evidence that Harkin's basic intent would be to simply place procedural limits on the use of the filibuster, a legislative maneuver that allows members of the chamber (usually of a minority party) to delay a vote indefinitely on a specific measure. The best idea I can think of would be to outlaw this undemocratic action-- the filibuster-- entirely. Since when are supermajorities necessary to deliver the will of a democratic majority.

Routinely, the problem with any debate about the filibuster is overwhelmed by the issue of the moment. That issue of the current moment is health care reform, and Joe Lieberman, the Senator from Aetna, has threatened to filibuster the legislation making its way through the Senate if it includes a passage extending Medicare coverage to Americans aged 55-64. Rank-and-file Democrats despise Lieberman rather thoroughly by now, but even many of them are hesitant to remove the filibuster from their Senators' playbooks for fear of what would then happen when Republicans are once again in the majority.

Bullknockers. Right is right.

Support for the concept of the filibuster is predicated on the idea that the majority will of the people is a dangerous thing when, in fact, the greatest threat to democracy is the tyranny of the minority. Naturally, citizens of every political stripe can find both historical examples of times their ideas were helped by the filibuster and times they were hindered. Liberals can point to successful filibusters, for example, that blocked the appointment of conservative judicial appointees. For some, this helps to balance out, or make up for the current blockade to health care reform legislation. But let me tell you, overwhelmingly, it's been the tyranny of the minority that has held us back from progressive action over the years.

The most famous filibuster of all time- with due respect to Strom Thurmond reading from the phone book while obstructing a vote on the 1957 Civil Rights Act-- was a fictional one. It was the one delivered by Jimmy Stewart in the penultimate moment of Frank Capra's 1939 film "Mr. Smith Goes To Washington." In the film's narrative, Smith battles exhaustion to stay at the podium day and night fighting for a youth camp for the "Boy Rangers" to be built on land in his home state against the sinister actions of a dam-building scheme by other Senators on the take.

Capra's film certainly glorified the act of filibustering, though many people today have a terribly distorted recollection of the film otherwise. "Mr. Smith" is a much darker-themed and less wholesome story than people generally think of it today. On last viewing, I didn't find Smith's actions all that heroic at all. Consider that he hijacks one of the two uppermost chambers of the nation's entire legislative branch so that he might bring home a little pork for his home state. It's certainly a triumph for the individual fortunate enough to be resident in the halls of power, but not so much for any collective action required of the multitudes. The film was fortunately saved otherwise by its subversive depiction overall of widespread corruption in the Senate chamber. Years later, though, it's worth noting that filibustering no longer requires such dramatic action. Rule changes during the 1970s ushered in the filibuster that doesn't even require the filibusterer to continue speaking or to even remain in attendance.

As it is, the composition of the United States Senate is heinously undemocratic. It was a bullshit compromise to begin with, and a colossal goof of our founding documents, to have such a powerful legislative body comprised of two representatives from each state regardless of the population of those states. The cherished principle of "one person, one vote" went out the window virtually from the start. The filibuster, which followed shortly after the founding of the Republic, was instituted to help protect the economic interests of Southern slaveholders, and has been used ever-increasingly during the generations following Emancipation to give the South and sparse regions of the West a disproportionate influence over Washington. We've been stricken with the cancerous tumor of a three-fifths supermajority government from Thomas Pinckney all the way through Jim Inhofe.

The Senate has suspended the filibuster at various times, as it has seen fit. In recent years, Republicans have used the threat of suspending the chamber rules-- the so-called "nuclear option"-- as a proverbial hammer to demand their way as a majority party. Democrats, conversely and characteristically, have routinely stuttered, then peed their pants. Lieberman, characteristic for him, has been on both sides of the debate during his tenure. In 1994, when Harkin last floated the idea of challenging the filibuster, Lieberman was a staunch supporter. Now he's the one threatening an historic obstruction.

Incidently, I have no alterior motive in advocating the banishment of the filibuster during the current health care debate. I oppose the health care proposal in question for reasons I've laid out before on the blog. But I oppose the filibuster for the same reason that I oppose the equally-undemocratic Electoral College-- because it's a political device designed to arm minority interests and to perpetuate and deepen the American class system. It should also be clear to any spectator of our modern American "democracy" that arming one single politician with so much individual power is thrusting all of us into a very dangerous game, as so many of our representatives have proven themselves transparently self-serving and thoroughly corruptible.

posted by CM @ 8:31 PM