I’m reading that the Senate’s votes on filibuster reform are likely to happen today. Senator Mark Udall of Colorado has introduced these proposals:
- No filibuster on a motion to proceed: An idea put forth by Senator Michael Bennet and me, this reform has been mentioned for decades with bipartisan support. It would save us time and prevent unnecessary delays by allowing us to begin debating a piece of legislation without obstruction.
- An end to secret holds: Eliminates the practice of one senator objecting on behalf of him- or herself unless he or she discloses the name of the objecting senator. This has been a longstanding problem, especially for judicial nominees.
- Continuous debate for a filibuster: Forces senators who object to proceeding to final passage to continue debate as long as there is pending business. In other words, it forces filibustering senators to actually filibuster.
- Guaranteed amendments for the minority: Protects the right of the minority to file amendments so long as they are germane and have been filed in a timely manner — one of the ideas I put forth in my initial proposal.
- Two hours of post-cloture debate on nominees: Post-cloture debate on nominations has been consistently used to slow down Senate business, which is why I support eliminating or sharply reducing post-cloture debate time on nominations.
Pretty good, all of them, it seems to me.
Earlier this week, I called Senator Kerry’s office, and was told that he supports Udall’s proposals. This morning I called Scott Brown’s office (202-224-4543) to ask the same thing but, as has become a pattern with Brown’s office, they could tell me nothing about Brown’s views. I wanted to know if there were any of Udall’s proposals that he was ambivalent about or had questions about, but all they would say was “I don’t know if Senator Brown has released a position yet”, and were completely not interested in talking about any of the specific proposals.
Would you call too, and see if you can get anything from them?
And let’s see how he votes on these proposals.
Staffer said that Sen. Brown is considering Sen. Udall’s reforeforms but believes that the filibuster is a “hallmark” of the Senate and it helps protect minority opinion. I asked if that meant no to all reform, and the staffer simply said that he is considering them all. It was hard to get the person off the talking point and into a discussion, so I dropped it figuring anything I may get by digging in wouldn’t have been authorized anyway.
Since none of Udall’s changes eliminate the filibuster, a blanket statement of the goodness of the filibuster’s existence avoids the question. Which, if any, of the reforms Udall proposed are things Brown has some hesitation on? And why?
I agree with you, I was just reporting what the staffer said.
Some changes, but filibuster stays intact.
The most critical proposal is #3. The point isn’t whether the filibuster stays intact or not, it’s whether it continues to be possible to filibuster casually, repeatedly, with no effort. But that post doesn’t actually say whether #3 or something like it is or isn’t part of the deal. I’ll have to look for other sources.
Yeah, 2 matters a lot, but I think from that post David linked to that we got that one.
Objecting for a colleague is like saying “I didn’t spit in the potato salad because I wanted to, but because one of my pals wanted to do it, and I’m not telling which one.” It’s fourth grade stuff.
<
p>The solution is simple: if you object, you object. You own it. You don’t get to do it “for a friend.” If you object for any reason, the media and the blogosphere and the rest should just keep stapling your name to it until folks won’t do it “for their friends” any more.
3 does not need a formal rule change. There’s nothing in the current rules that says the majority leader can’t say, “I’m scheduling this bill for a vote at 1:00 next Wednesday; if you don’t want that to happen you’d better be in the middle of a floor speech.” The real reason things stall is that the majority rolls over as soon as the INTENT to filibuster is announced.
3 would’ve prevented this “rolling over”, but you do have a point – we can get #3 without a rule change, if the majority sticks to it persistently. We ought to organize to make that happen.