Big Backing for Udall Filibuster Limits

Sen. Tom Udall’s push to change Senate rules and blunt the impact of the filibuster appeared to get a big boost last week when Majority Leader Harry Reid vowed to make it happen in the next Congress.

“We’re going to change the rules,” Reid was quoted as saying in the Washington Post on Wednesday. “We cannot continue in this way.”

As Udall’s office pointed out, this isn’t exactly news. Reid has been talking about the need to reform Senate rules for some time. But two years ago — at the beginning of the current Congress, when Udall first began pushing for filibuster reform — he didn’t have Reid’s full support. The majority leader, frustrated by an inability to move virtually any legislation despite holding the Senate majority, has apparently had a change of heart.

“Harry Reid is on our side and that’s the biggest difference,” Udall said. “Harry wants this to happen, he’s pushing for it to happen and he’s making phone calls with us to make sure people are on board with this.”

Udall plans to initiate the rules change using a so-called “constitutional option” that can only be employed on the first day of the Senate. The key thing about this first-day vote is that under Senate rules, it requires the support of just 51 senators, or a simply majority. It can not be held hostage by a filibuster, or endless debate to kill a piece of legislation.

The whole idea, Udall said, is making the Senate more functional.

“People in New Mexico can expect a Congress that is more responsive to their needs,” he told me last week.”We’ll be more responsive to things people in New Mexico really care about.”

The reform proposal currently shaping up has two key components. The first is a move to disallow filibusters of a so-called “motion to proceed.” The motion to proceed is a routine vote that allows for debate on a bill. Under Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s direction, Republicans have routinely threatened to filibuster motions to proceed, preventing even any debate on a particular bill.

The rules change proposal would not, however, preclude actual filibusters of legislation. That’s where the second part of the change comes in. Udall and other supporters of reform believe that a filibuster should be just that — endless debate on a bill until the person mounting the filibuster either wears out or the other side caves in.

Currently, it takes 60 votes to invoke cloture, or to cut off debate on a piece of legislation and move to a vote. But for years, Republicans and Democrats — whichever party is in the minority — have been able to prevent cloture votes in the narrowly controlled Senate. The other side then simply concedes defeat and the matter is done.

But under the proposed rules change, senators objecting to a cloture will have to come to the floor and talk — and talk and talk. In the past — about 10 years ago when I first got to Washington — there were some threats of real filibusters, but they never materialized. It makes great theater as Capitol staff wheel in cots for weary senators to sleep on during the supposed days-long, never-ending debates. If Udall gets his way we could see the theater return to the U.S. Senate, which is now about as exciting as watching paint dry.

“If you’re going to object, you want to delay and you’re going to obstruct you have to go to the floor and talk,” Udall said. “Those folks who don’t want to invoke cloture are really asking for debate because it’s a motion to cut off debate. …

“We’re not abolishing the filibuster — we’re not abolishing the 60 votes — we’re forcing the minority members to go to the floor and do a talking filibuster,” Udall said.

Of course, not everyone — most of all McConnell — supports the rules changes. Opponents contend the filibuster protects the rights of the minority in American politics, assures stability and deliberation in government, and helps to preserve constitutional principles of checks and balances and separation of powers.

And they are also quick to point out that what comes around goes around. After all, no party maintains control of the Senate forever.

Udall said that’s fine with him.

“We have drafted the rules changes in such a way that we can live with them,” Udall said. “We’re not trying to prevent the minority from debating or being heard. This is an effort to make the Senate be able to work better and to get away from this dysfunction we’ve been in for a number of years here.”

E-mail: mcoleman@abqjournal.com. Go to ABQjournal.com/letters/new to submit a letter to the editor.