Why Kamala Harris is Wrong and the Filibuster is Great
In this year’s election cycle, both candidates are making the case for why they should be elected (or re-elected) president of the United States. One of these candidates, the Democratic nominee Vice President Kamala Harris, says that she would support ending the filibuster to bring back Roe v. Wade’s federal protections of abortion. This, unfortunately, demonstrates that Harris neither understands why the filibuster exists nor the consequences incurred by the Democrats’ previous attempts to roll back the filibuster.
To understand why the filibuster exists we must learn how it came into existence. While the official Senate filibuster rule did not come into existence until 1917, the tactic of “filibustering,” or using lengthy speeches to delay legislative action, emerged as early as the first Senate session. On Sept. 22, 1789, Sen. William Maclay of Pennsylvania noted in his diary that the Virginians aimed to “talk away the time” to prevent a bill from passing. This occurred because back then the Senate didn’t have official rules for ending debate. As the Senate got larger, filibustering became frequent and the demand for a new rule to limit debate would increase as well. Eventually, in 1917, Senate Rule 22 was enacted to allow a vote of 66 senators to force an end to debate. In 1975, the threshold to invoke what became known as “cloture” was lowered to 60 votes.
It may seem confusing for the Senate not to end debate with a simple majority vote, but that is the point of the Senate. The Founders designed the Senate, a smaller body, to pause, deliberate, reflect on and amend legislation more carefully than the House. During the Constitutional Convention of 1787, the Senate’s purpose was to “check the inconsiderate and hasty proceedings” of the House. The current rule also fits with the spirit in which our government was formed. James Madison’s Federalist 10, one of the most foundational documents of our government, outlines the dangers of mob rule. The filibuster not only ensures that the Senate fills its role as envisioned by the founders, it also protects minority factions from the majority and prevents mob rule.
While the filibuster was used to protect segregation, the recent calls to eliminate the filibuster stem less from a desire for a better legislative process and more from frustration over the inability to pass specific policy proposals. While both sides may be prevented from advancing “urgent” priorities quickly when in power, rushing such changes risks backfiring when they eventually find themselves in the minority.
For example, in 2013, frustrated by Senate Republicans’ blockade of then-President Barack Obama’s judicial nominees, the Democratic Senate majority decided to do away with the 60-vote filibuster for votes confirming federal judges below the Supreme Court level. The new rule allowed a bare majority of senators to end debate and force a final vote. When that occurred, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell told Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and the Democratic senators, “You’ll regret this, and you may regret this a lot sooner than you think.” While the Democrats did get Obama’s judicial nominees confirmed, it would come to haunt them a few years later when they lost the Senate majority in 2014 and President Donald Trump was elected in 2016. Following that election, no rules or government mechanisms existed to allow Democratic senators to block judicial appointments confirmed by a bare Republican majority.
In April 2017, McConnell and Senate Republicans made good on their threat, and eliminated the 60-vote filibuster exception for Supreme Court nominees to help confirm Judge Neil Gorsuch despite Democratic objections. Republicans were also able to help Trump easily nominate and confirm two other justices, shifting the court to the right overnight and making the court the most conservative it has been in 90 years. Eventually, the elimination of the judicial filibuster resulted in the very decision to overrule Roe v. Wade that got us to Harris’ pledge to eliminate the legislative filibuster as well.
The vice president should recall the laws of holes — if you find yourself in a hole, stop digging. The Democrats’ previous attempts to roll back the filibuster has already resulted in disaster for their political agenda, and they’d be better off calling it quits before going forward with a policy that’ll empower their opponents as much as it does themselves. It is likely that no party or partisan, Democratic or Republican, would be eager to live under the legislation passed by a Senate opposed to their interests and unburdened by minority input.
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Photo Caption: The U.S. Senate Chamber
Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons
