Quick Points on the "Sacred" Senate Filibuster

With all of the Democratic talk about how triggering the constitutional option to eliminate judicial filibusters would "destroy" the rules and traditions of the Senate, I just have a few points:

-There is no mention of a Senate filibuster in the Constitution.

-In 1806, the Senate changed its rules so that a unanimous vote was required to end debate. The rule change allowed a single Senator to prevent the majority from voting on any matter.

-In 1917 at President Wilson's urging, the Senate adopted Rule XXII, which replaced the rule of unanimity with a two-thirds requirement.

-In 1975, the filibuster rule was changed again to reduce the requirement to three-fifths of the votes, or 60 Senators.

-Today's filibuster is essentially just a threat to filibuster, so that the American public does not know they even occur. (Mr. Smith is a thing of the past.)

-There has been only one filibuster of a judicial nominee in the history of the U.S.: In 1968, Justice Abe Fortas (already a judge but nominated to the Supreme Court), was filibustered. Fortas soon admitted that he briefed the president on secret Court deliberations, had pressured senators who opposed the war in Vietnam and received a secret stipend (equal to 40% of his Court salary) to teach an American University summer course. These revelations eroded both Democrat and Republican support for Fortas' nomination and President Johnson withdrew the nomination.

-Senate Republicans under Clinton did not require filibusters because they were the majority of the Senate. Thus, many of Clinton's nominees did not receive majority support in the committee.

-Senate rules can not be too "sacred," since Harry Reid disregarded them himself by stating he viewed nominee Henry Saad's confidential FBI files. Since Reid is neither a member of the Judiciary Committee nor from Saad's home state, his viewing of the files was clearly against Senate rules.

In summary, there is nothing "sacred" about Senate rules. The only thing that I consider sacred and unchanging (except by the established amendment process) is the Constitution. Unfortunately, the Democrats believe differently: to them, the Constitution is merely a "living, breathing document" that changes over time based on a judge's wishes.

Wendy Long recently wrote a great piece on the filibuster myths.

{Link to Mudville's Open Post}