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Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) has put a new twist on the Senate filibuster reform effort. He’s a cosponsor of the Udall/Merkley/Harkin plan to change the Senate rules. But he added a one-page tweak to the rules that would place the burden more on the entity doing the filibustering than the entity trying to break the filibuster. Here’s the entire change:
SECTION 1. AMENDMENT TO THE STANDING RULES OF THE SENATE.
The second undesignated paragraph of paragraph 2 of rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate is amended by striking ‘‘And if that question shall be decided in the affirmative by three-fifths of the Senators duly chosen and sworn’’ and inserting ‘‘And if that question is decided in the affirmative and there are not negative votes by more than two-fifths of the Senators duly chosen and sworn’’.
What that means is that, instead of needing 60 votes to break a filibuster, you would need 41 votes to sustain it. This would actually be somewhat meaningful. There have been multiple instances where the majority has been unable to get one of their people back to Washington in time to break a filibuster, or where one Senator had passed away. Think about the entire several months when Franken was still fighting out the election in Minnesota, and the Senate had a 59-40 split. Under these rules, the majority wouldn’t have needed another Republican to break filibusters; it would just have had to stop one of its members from shifting to the other side.
The entire point of these rule changes is two-fold: 1) make non-controversial legislation go faster, 2) make it more of a burden to keep up the filibuster. I don’t really think these rule changes go far enough, but they all fulfill that goal. If you’re the group filibustering, you now need all 41 of your members to vote (that doesn’t happen a whole lot; Republicans over the last two years have routinely skipped votes rather than join a filibuster); you need to sustain the filibuster through a talk-a-thon; if at any time you stop the talk-a-thon and give up the floor cloture will be invoked; you will be incented to stop the talk-a-thon with the promise of at least three post-cloture amendments (this can actually get a bit problematic, so we’ll see how that evolves).
It’s not a bold return to a majority-vote legislature, but it’s not nothing. And Franken’s piece, while on the margins, would help
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Once again here’s what I predict will be the Schumer compromise:
They will replace the word “cloture” with “unanimous consent agreement” and the filibuster will take place off-camera.
The end.
Why do I suspect that the net result of the Franken amendment and these other changes will merely make it harder for the poor Democrats to filibuster GOP bills as DINO’s break ranks to join the Rethuglicans?
“See, we fought so hard, but we just couldn’t prevail. Now, can I have your vote and some cash for my campaign fund?”
Yes, it is important to look at it from several perspectives. In some ways I like Franken’s amendment, but fundamentally I wonder if it’s right to make the Senate operate that way. What I mean is that normally you have to gather support to move on something, but Al says moving happens unless you can gather support to stop it. Of course, the movement is not to pass legislation, but to move toward a ending debate and on to a vote. But still, is it right to put the onus on the opposition rather than on those who want to do something?
oops, wrong thread!
Well Spit! Bill Gates is a jerk. Always has been. What does he know about the labor of a school teacher?
I heart my junior senator.