Larry434 wrote:As for the filibuster issue, oh come now! It has been used by the party out of power since time immemorial
Not to obstruct votes on judicial nominees, it hasn't.
So? Senate Republicans can pick their battles, Senate Democrats can pick theirs.
The Democratics in Congress are not going to roll over and play dead when it comes to any issue as important as the judiciary. Okay? Some Republicans seem to think we would be better off with no opposing thought in the process but so far democracy has stood in their way.
And stop spouting nonsense, it's not as if the Democrats are opposing every nominee the President sends up to the hill, the numbers are somewhere in the neighborhood of three hundred and sixty five consented to and six sent back. That's a fair percentage of objection in anyone's book, some would maybe a little too fair.
Think about it. Do you really want to live in a country where there is no opposition? Should it be all four hundred and one judges approved just so the Republicans can have it their way?
Wouldn't that be kind of a bad example to set for the new Iraqi voters? Didn't we just overthrow one-party rule there or did I miss something?
Joe (Indivisible) Nation
Sounds to me, Larry, that you would prefer a congress that rolls over and does whatever Bush wants it to.
Some things need to be obstructed.
Quote:It is the job of the Senate to give advice(sic) and consent.
They don't call the US Senate the world's most deliberative body for nothing. It
is the Senate's work to advise, and in order to do that they must also inquire, examine, balance and judge.
The Senate is designed to be, and has been, the place where heads take a cooler look at issues and more often then not come up with the right solutions to fit this nation of many differences. If we were to lose the Senate as an organ of diligent but deliberate discussion, then the writer's of history would take up their pens and begin to sketch out the obituary of this Republic.
Joe (whoa) Nation
The filibuster was used by Southern Democrats (when they still existed) to stop civil rights legislation from passing. There's nothing new here. Just because your side may be hurt by it, Larry, doesn't mean it's time to change the rules.
Yet that's how the game is being played now, isn't it? The GOP will do whatever it can, i.e., rig the system, so that it will be as difficult as possible for the Democrats to return to power.
The filibuster. Don't do as I do do as I say. Republican credo
Republicans control the White House, both houses of Congress and the Supreme Court. But the greater their power, the more they have focused on one of its few limits: the Senate filibuster. They are so concerned that Democrats will use the filibuster to block a few far-right judicial nominees that they are talking about ending one of the best-known checks and balances in government. Rather than rewrite the rules of government for a power grab, Republicans should look for ways to work with Democrats, who still represent nearly half the country..
The filibuster is almost as old as America itself. In 1790, senators filibustered to prevent Philadelphia from becoming the permanent U.S. capital. In the centuries since, senators have used their privilege of unlimited debate to fend off actions supported by a bare majority of the Senate, but deeply offensive to the minority. In 1917, the Senate adopted a formal resolution allowing senators to delay actions unless debate is cut off by a supermajority, which Senate rules now set at 60 votes..
The filibuster has a storied place in U.S. history and popular culture. During the Depression, Huey Long of Louisiana fought off a bill he opposed by reciting recipes for fried oysters and potlikker. In the 1939 film "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington," Jimmy Stewart triumphed over crooked politicians with a 23-hour filibuster. Filibusters were used, notoriously, by Southern senators to fight civil rights legislation. But even during those dark days, the Senate considered the right to filibuster sacrosanct..
Judicial nominees have never been immune from filibusters. When Republicans opposed President Lyndon Johnson's choice for chief justice, Abe Fortas, they led a successful filibuster to stop him from getting the job. More recently, in the Clinton era, Republicans spoke out loudly in defense of their right to filibuster against the confirmation of cabinet members and judicial nominees. Republican senators, including Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania and Mike DeWine of Ohio, used a filibuster in 1995 to block President Bill Clinton's nominee for surgeon general. Bill Frist, now the Senate majority leader, supported a filibuster of a Clinton appeals court nomination. .
Now that Republicans are doing the appointing, they see things very differently. Frist recently declared that preventing votes on judicial nominees is "intolerable." According to Senate rules, changing the filibuster rule should require a two-thirds vote, but among the proposals Republicans are floating is the so-called nuclear option, under which Vice President Dick Cheney, as Senate president, would rule that filibusters of judicial nominees could be ended by a simple majority..
That would no doubt put the whole matter in the courts, an odd place for the Republicans - who are fighting this battle in the name of ending activist courts - to want it resolved. The Republicans would have a weak case. The Constitution expressly authorizes the Senate to "determine the rules of its proceedings." That is precisely what it has done..
If it came to a vote, it is not at all clear that the Republicans would be able to command even a majority for ending the filibuster. Senators appreciate their chamber's special role, and much of its uniqueness is based on traditions like the filibuster. .
Republicans see the filibuster as an annoying obstacle. But it is actually one of the checks and balances that the founders, who worried greatly about concentration of power, built into America's system of government. It is also, right now, the main means by which the 48 percent of American voters who supported John Kerry can influence federal policy. People who call themselves conservatives should find a way of achieving their goals without declaring war on one of the oldest traditions in American democracy..
The Abe Fortas filibuster was extremely short lived.
On June 26, 1968, President Johnson nominated Justice Fortas to Chief Justice Warren's seat. Senators from both parties opposed the Fortas nomination for a variety of reasons, some plausible (e.g., that Justice Fortas, who had been a trusted adviser to President Johnson before his nomination, had continued to participate in White House decision making during his tenure on the Court), some not so plausible (e.g., that President Johnson should not be allowed to choose Chief Justice Warren's successor because the president was a lame duck). Whatever the merits, the criticisms did not prevent a relatively rapid decision on the nomination, which was reported out of the Judiciary Committee (by divided vote) in the middle of September and was opened to floor debate on Sept. 24.
Abe Fortas
A filibuster followed, but not for long. On Oct. 1, the Senate voted on a motion for cloture that would have ended debate on the nomination and allowed an immediate vote on whether to confirm Justice Fortas as chief justice.
The Congressional Record for Oct. 1, 1968, shows that 45 senators voted for cloture, 43 voted against. However, if the senators who did not vote are taken into account, we find that 48 were on record as opposing cloture, 47 as favoring it. Indeed, at least one of the senators who voted for cloture, Republican John Sherman Cooper of Kentucky, said that he would vote against the Fortas nomination if it came to a vote. Another who voted for cloture proposed immediately after the vote that the president withdraw the nomination and submit a name that could be quickly confirmed. This evidence alone shows that of the 47 on record for cloture, at least one, if not more, was actually opposed to the Fortas nomination.
Perhaps that is the reason why Justice Fortas decided to ask that his nomination be withdrawn, and why President Johnson promptly complied on Oct. 4.
The Dems stretched the filibusters in the last Congress to a customary and regular method to deny Bush nominees a vote on the Senate floor.
EDITORIAL
The Speaker Who Would Be Maître D'
Published: December 2, 2004
The speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert, has reached a dangerous new level of partisan zealotry to bolster the Republicans' control of government. For the new Congress, Mr. Hastert intends to cater to what he calls "the majority of the majority" in deciding which bills will get a vote and which won't. He has little use for the bipartisan majorities idealized in civics classes and once seen even in the House.
Mr. Hastert first enunciated his approach last year in a speech. "The job of speaker is not to expedite legislation that runs counter to the wishes of the majority of his majority," he said. At the time, it sounded like mere grandstanding. But it was put into practice last month when Mr. Hastert - ostensibly tasked by President Bush with steering the intelligence reform bill to passage - trembled before opposition in his caucus and blocked the final compromise from a floor vote. Since this was in secret, it is not even clear that "the majority of the majority" exercised a veto; it was enough for Republican leaders to sense that plenty of Democrats would vote for the compromise on this desperately needed bill.
Capitol history shows that Democratic majorities did not hesitate to abuse Republican minorities. But during the long years when Democrats controlled the House, on some major bills affecting the national interest - like balancing the budget, reforming welfare and approving the free trade agreement during the Clinton years - Republicans were afforded a role. The Hastert doctrine hobbles any notion of compromise.
The speaker, whose candor is breathtaking in relegating the Democratic minority to somewhere beyond the pale, seems to be trying to solidify his influence over the members of the more conservative incoming majority. But cravenly surrendering his gavel to them seems an odd way to do that. It leaves Mr. Hastert looking more like a maître d' offering favored customers a good table than the most powerful man in Congress.
Ousting the Umpire
Thursday, December 30, 2004; Page A26
WHEN IT STARTED to look as though House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) might be indicted by a prosecutor in his home state, the House GOP rule requiring indicted members to relinquish their leadership positions became rather inconvenient. House Republicans responded by junking the rule. During the last Congress, Rep. Joel Hefley (R-Colo.), chairman of the House Ethics Committee, proved himself something of an inconvenience as well when it came to Mr. DeLay: Under his leadership, the all-too-often slumbering committee bestirred itself to admonish the majority leader for an array of ethical missteps. Now Mr. Hefley risks meeting the same fate as the discarded rule. House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) is poised to decide whether to let Mr. Hefley continue in the thankless task of heading the committee. According to The Post's Mike Allen, Mr. Hastert is leaning toward removing Mr. Hefley.
Mr. Hastert's spokesman, John Feehery, says that no decision has been made about Mr. Hefley's continued tenure and that, if he were to be removed from the committee, it would be for "no other reason" than that he has served as chairman since 2001. "That's a pretty long time," Mr. Feehery told us. "It's tough duty being an ethics chairman." Mr. Feehery said later that House rules would bar Mr. Hefley from remaining on the committee -- a tortured reading of clear rules that in any event could be waived by the speaker.
The speaker's respect for the rules and his solicitude for his colleague is touching but misplaced. From all indications, Mr. Hefley would like to remain on the ethics job. So it's hard to see his ouster, if it occurs, as anything other than payback for calling Mr. DeLay's fouls -- and as a means of avoiding other tough judgments in the future. That's not merely a theoretical possibility. The committee already has some sensitive matters on its plate, including Ohio Republican Robert W. Ney's dealings with lobbyist Jack Abramoff, and it could find itself again delving into Mr. DeLay, once the Texas prosecutor has completed his probe. Junking the umpire because you don't like his calls is no more attractive than changing the rules of the game when they turn out not to be to your advantage. If this is indeed the speaker's inclination, we hope he reconsiders.
Democracy in action the republican way.
