The 2012 election left the Republicans, under control of the Tea Party wing, still in control of the House, but added two seats to the Democratic U.S. Senate majority, making it 53-45 with two independents who caucus with the Democrats.
More importantly, Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said before the election that he had had it with the Republicans’ obstructionist tactics and overuse of the filibuster. Some 389 filibusters and filibuster threats derailed legislation, nominations, even just routine business in the 112th Congress.
Saying the requirement for 60 votes to end GOP talkathons on virtually everything strangles democracy, the Communications Workers have been on a crusade to change the filibuster rules.
Now, they’ve enlisted 51 allied groups, including the Auto Workers, the Brennan Center for Law and Justice and other public interests, in the Fix the Senate Now coalition.
The coalition put public pressure on the Senate to change its rules and lessen the ability of a minority, or even one senator, to bring everything to a grinding halt. A filibuster threat in the Democratic-run 111th Congress, for example, prevented the Employee Free Choice Act, labor’s top legislative priority, from even coming up for debate.
The coalition says forcing the Senate to debate bills, rather than being able to kill them just by the threat of a filibuster up front, would be in the public interest.
"It\'s not so much about what are we going to enact," Cohen told interviewer Ed Schultz recently, especially since the GOP still runs the House. "It\'s about ‘Is the Senate going to discuss anything?’"
“This is not what democracy looks like,” Cohen has repeatedly said of the filibuster rule.
One change the unions and their allies want senators to enact is to actually force senators to come to the floor and filibuster, rather than just derail legislation by a threat. Before the abuses of the last decade or so, filibusters were actual talkathons – and rare.
Notably, Southern segregationists often used them against civil rights legislation.
Another change the coalition advocates – and Reid has endorsed – is eliminating filibusters and filibuster threats on preliminary parliamentary moves. Right now, the Senate has at least two chances for a filibuster on virtually anything: One on the “motion to proceed” to debate the issue, and the second on the issue itself.
Other ideas being pushed for filibuster reform include gradual reduction of the number of senators needed to stop such talkathons. Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa., has been pushing that plan for at least 15 years. The first vote to stop a filibuster would still need 60 senators to succeed, he says. But then the second would need 57, the third 54 and the fourth 51, in the 100-member Senate.
Legal scholars also point out that even when the Senate votes to stop a filibuster, there can still be 30 hours scheduled for debate on legislation or a nomination. That could effectively tie up the Senate, too, they say.
Cohen says the key point is to get the foes of legislation and nominations to stand up and say so in public and at length – and take the political consequences.
Mark Gruenberg writes for Press Associates, Inc., news service. Used by permission.
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The 2012 election left the Republicans, under control of the Tea Party wing, still in control of the House, but added two seats to the Democratic U.S. Senate majority, making it 53-45 with two independents who caucus with the Democrats.
More importantly, Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said before the election that he had had it with the Republicans’ obstructionist tactics and overuse of the filibuster. Some 389 filibusters and filibuster threats derailed legislation, nominations, even just routine business in the 112th Congress.
Saying the requirement for 60 votes to end GOP talkathons on virtually everything strangles democracy, the Communications Workers have been on a crusade to change the filibuster rules.
Now, they’ve enlisted 51 allied groups, including the Auto Workers, the Brennan Center for Law and Justice and other public interests, in the Fix the Senate Now coalition.
The coalition put public pressure on the Senate to change its rules and lessen the ability of a minority, or even one senator, to bring everything to a grinding halt. A filibuster threat in the Democratic-run 111th Congress, for example, prevented the Employee Free Choice Act, labor’s top legislative priority, from even coming up for debate.
The coalition says forcing the Senate to debate bills, rather than being able to kill them just by the threat of a filibuster up front, would be in the public interest.
"It\’s not so much about what are we going to enact," Cohen told interviewer Ed Schultz recently, especially since the GOP still runs the House. "It\’s about ‘Is the Senate going to discuss anything?’"
“This is not what democracy looks like,” Cohen has repeatedly said of the filibuster rule.
One change the unions and their allies want senators to enact is to actually force senators to come to the floor and filibuster, rather than just derail legislation by a threat. Before the abuses of the last decade or so, filibusters were actual talkathons – and rare.
Notably, Southern segregationists often used them against civil rights legislation.
Another change the coalition advocates – and Reid has endorsed – is eliminating filibusters and filibuster threats on preliminary parliamentary moves. Right now, the Senate has at least two chances for a filibuster on virtually anything: One on the “motion to proceed” to debate the issue, and the second on the issue itself.
Other ideas being pushed for filibuster reform include gradual reduction of the number of senators needed to stop such talkathons. Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa., has been pushing that plan for at least 15 years. The first vote to stop a filibuster would still need 60 senators to succeed, he says. But then the second would need 57, the third 54 and the fourth 51, in the 100-member Senate.
Legal scholars also point out that even when the Senate votes to stop a filibuster, there can still be 30 hours scheduled for debate on legislation or a nomination. That could effectively tie up the Senate, too, they say.
Cohen says the key point is to get the foes of legislation and nominations to stand up and say so in public and at length – and take the political consequences.
Mark Gruenberg writes for Press Associates, Inc., news service. Used by permission.