Jimmy Stewart as a US Senator conducting a one man filibuster in the iconic
pro-democracy movie "Mr. Smith Goes To Washington"
The filibuster in the US Senate is iconic. One of the greatest pro-democracy movies in history, “Mr. Smith Goes To Washington”, was made about it. It has been around since 1806, when Senators realized that without such a safeguard the Senate could not fulfill it’s role of being on check of the raw democracy of the House. No, it’s not in the Constitution – but it has proven to be an absolutely essential component of our democratic republic. It forces the majority and the minority to sit down, talk to each other and find a compromise.
In our deeply divided nation, ending the filibuster would allow the narrow majority in the House and Senate to crush the minority. We do not live in a pure democracy – we live in a republic where the minority still has rights. Ending the filibuster would end those important minority rights.
It doesn’t take much imagination to see what would follow the end of the filibuster. Packing the Supreme Court with new justices who don’t care what the Constitution actually says would come first. After that, we would see rigged elections institutionalized and a permanent one party government – just like California. From there we would see the end of freedom of religion, freedom of speech and freedom of the press. The left has already tipped their hand on these issues. The red states simply would not stand for this – period. If the extreme left of the Democratic party gets their way in a post filibuster America, the most likely outcome would be a horrible civil war in which there would be no winners, only losers.
Right now are two people standing in the way of this disaster: Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Sen. Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona (both Democrats). Both Senators are from conservative, pro-gun rights states. Both are in favor of increased gun control – which will never pass as long as the filibuster is in place. Both are also under increasing pressure from their own party.
From the Washington Post:
Liberals
have long pushed for sweeping changes like expanding the Supreme Court,
ending the electoral college and banning gerrymandering. But as Biden
faces a critical stretch of his presidency, even moderate Democrats are
urging more immediate changes - particularly rewriting the filibuster,
so that at the very least fewer bills need 60 votes to pass the Senate.
Democrats increasingly worry that popular pieces of Biden’s agenda will hit a wall in the Senate, including his plans for climate change, immigration, gun control, voting rights and LGBT protections. Failing to enact them, they fear, could be a political disaster for Democrats as well as a substantive one.
Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., a centrist, said Wednesday she wants to “get rid of the filibuster,” her toughest comments to date on the matter. By Thursday, Sen. Tina Smith, D-Minn., announced on via social media that she, too, now wants to abolish the filibuster, because “the more I thought about it, the more I realized that the filibuster has long been the enemy of progress.”
Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., also a moderate, told The Washington Post he could envision the Senate changing the filibuster if bills are floundering. “We’ve got to figure out whether leadership on both sides wants to have obstruction, or if they want to come together and try to get some things done,” Tester said.
Democrats increasingly worry that popular pieces of Biden’s agenda will hit a wall in the Senate, including his plans for climate change, immigration, gun control, voting rights and LGBT protections. Failing to enact them, they fear, could be a political disaster for Democrats as well as a substantive one.
Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., a centrist, said Wednesday she wants to “get rid of the filibuster,” her toughest comments to date on the matter. By Thursday, Sen. Tina Smith, D-Minn., announced on via social media that she, too, now wants to abolish the filibuster, because “the more I thought about it, the more I realized that the filibuster has long been the enemy of progress.”
Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., also a moderate, told The Washington Post he could envision the Senate changing the filibuster if bills are floundering. “We’ve got to figure out whether leadership on both sides wants to have obstruction, or if they want to come together and try to get some things done,” Tester said.
So, it is very clear that the filibuster – and with it our nation - is at risk.
Now it appears that the issue that could bring all of this to a head is an expanded firearms background check bill that is a virtual duplicate of Manchin’s failed 2013 bill. So far, Manchin seems to be holding firm against the pressure:
"Never!"
he shouted at a journalist who asked whether setbacks to the Democratic
agenda might lead him to reconsider (ending the filibuster), per a pool
report filed Monday night by Bloomberg News' Erik Wasson. "Jesus
Christ, what don't you understand about 'never'?"
Of course, there is a more selfish reason why Manchin is opposed to ending the filibuster: If he does it, he will never be reelected. However, he could change his mind if he was sure that he would have another job when his time in the Senate ends. If Democrats held a greater majority in the Senate, they could just give him a cabinet post in exchange for his vote – but if they did that, the Republican governor of West Virginia would replace him with a Republican and they would lose their majority. Therefore, they would be forced to promise him some other job when his current term ends – which would require a lot of trust on Manchin’s part. Of course, Republicans would love it if Manchin were to switch parties (he is the only Democrat holding a statewide office in West Virginia, so he clearly would be reelected) – so they could promise to vote for his gun control bill in order to get him to switch. Either way, his gun control bill will likely be the carrot dangled in front of him.
Time will tell what will happen – but whatever the outcome, gun control will likely be at the center of it.
