Download or read book Filibustering written by Gregory Koger and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2010-06-15 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the modern Congress, one of the highest hurdles for major bills or nominations is gaining the sixty votes necessary to shut off a filibuster in the Senate. But this wasn’t always the case. Both citizens and scholars tend to think of the legislative process as a game played by the rules in which votes are the critical commodity—the side that has the most votes wins. In this comprehensive volume,Gregory Koger shows, on the contrary, that filibustering is a game with slippery rules in which legislators who think fast and try hard can triumph over superior numbers. Filibustering explains how and why obstruction has been institutionalized in the U.S. Senate over the last fifty years, and how this transformation affects politics and policymaking. Koger also traces the lively history of filibustering in the U.S. House during the nineteenth century and measures the effects of filibustering—bills killed, compromises struck, and new issues raised by obstruction. Unparalleled in the depth of its theory and its combination of historical and political analysis, Filibustering will be the definitive study of its subject for years to come.
Download or read book Kill Switch The Rise of the Modern Senate and the Crippling of American Democracy written by Adam Jentleson and published by Liveright Publishing. This book was released on 2021-01-12 with total page 301 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With a new epilogue on filibuster battles under the Biden administration THE CASE FOR ENDING THE FILIBUSTER "A truly excellent book… blistering and persuasive.” —Ezra Klein, New York Times An insider’s account of how politicians representing a radical white minority of Americans have used “the world’s greatest deliberative body” to hijack our democracy. Our democracy is under assault from homegrown authoritarians, with most observers blaming Donald Trump and the Republican Party that submitted to him. Yet as Adam Jentleson shows, the problem not only goes back to the nineteenth century, but is less about the presidency than it is about our nation’s most venerated institution: the United States Senate. A revelatory history of minority rule in America as expressed through the Senate filibuster, Kill Switch shows that white conservatives have long relied on the filibuster—which is not featured in the Constitution, and which, as Jentleson demonstrates, the Framers would have opposed—to shut down attempts to create a multiracial democracy. Featuring a new epilogue on filibuster battles under the Biden administration, Kill Switch will remain an essential warning about the costs of empowering this nation’s right-wing minority. • “Jentleson understands the inner workings of the institution, down to the most granular details, showing precisely how arcane procedural rules can be leveraged to dramatic effect.” —Jennifer Szalai, New York Times • “Careful and thorough and exacting.” —Michael Tomasky, New York Review of Books • “[An] excellent, surprising new book.” —Benjamin Wallace-Wells, The New Yorker
Download or read book Exceptions to the Rule written by Molly E. Reynolds and published by Brookings Institution Press. This book was released on 2017-07-18 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Special rules enable the Senate to act despite the filibuster. Sometimes. Most people believe that, in today's partisan environment, the filibuster prevents the Senate from acting on all but the least controversial matters. But this is not exactly correct. In fact, the Senate since the 1970s has created a series of special rules—described by Molly Reynolds as “majoritarian exceptions”—that limit debate on a wide range of measures on the Senate floor. The details of these exemptions might sound arcane and technical, but in practice they have enabled the Senate to act even when it otherwise seemed paralyzed. Important examples include procedures used to pass the annual congressional budget resolution, enact budget reconciliation bills, review proposals to close military bases, attempt to prevent arms sales, ratify trade agreements, and reconsider regulations promulgated by the executive branch. Reynolds argues that these procedures represent a key instrument of majority party power in the Senate. They allow the majority—even if it does not have the sixty votes needed to block a filibuster—to produce policies that will improve its future electoral prospects, and thus increase the chances it remains the majority party. As a case study, Exceptions to the Rule examines the Senate's role in the budget reconciliation process, in which particular congressional committees are charged with developing procedurally protected proposals to alter certain federal programs in their jurisdictions. Created as a way of helping Congress work through tricky budget issues, the reconciliation process has become a powerful tool for the majority party to bypass the minority and adopt policy changes in hopes that it will benefit in the next election cycle.
Download or read book Filibuster written by Gregory J. Wawro and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2013-10-24 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Parliamentary obstruction, popularly known as the "filibuster," has been a defining feature of the U.S. Senate throughout its history. In this book, Gregory J. Wawro and Eric Schickler explain how the Senate managed to satisfy its lawmaking role during the nineteenth and early twentieth century, when it lacked seemingly essential formal rules for governing debate. What prevented the Senate from self-destructing during this time? The authors argue that in a system where filibusters played out as wars of attrition, the threat of rule changes prevented the institution from devolving into parliamentary chaos. They show that institutional patterns of behavior induced by inherited rules did not render Senate rules immune from fundamental changes. The authors' theoretical arguments are supported through a combination of extensive quantitative and case-study analysis, which spans a broad swath of history. They consider how changes in the larger institutional and political context--such as the expansion of the country and the move to direct election of senators--led to changes in the Senate regarding debate rules. They further investigate the impact these changes had on the functioning of the Senate. The book concludes with a discussion relating battles over obstruction in the Senate's past to recent conflicts over judicial nominations.
Download or read book The Speech written by Bernie Sanders and published by Bold Type Books. This book was released on 2015-12-22 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: On Friday, December 10, 2010, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders walked on to the floor of the United States Senate and began speaking. It turned out to be a very long speech, lasting over eight and a half hours. And it hit a nerve. Millions followed the speech online until the traffic crashed the Senate server. A huge, positive grassroots response tied up the phones in the senator's offices in Vermont and Washington. President Obama reportedly held an impromptu press conference with former President Clinton to deflect media attention away from Sanders' speech. Editorials and news coverage appeared throughout the world. In his speech, Sanders blasted the agreement that President Obama struck with Republicans, which extended the Bush tax cuts for millionaires and billionaires, lowered estate tax rates for the very, very rich, and set a terrible precedent by establishing a "payroll tax holiday" diverting revenue away from the Social Security Trust Fund, threatening the fund's very future. But the speech was more than a critique of a particular piece of legislation. It was a dissection of the collapse of the American middle class and a well-researched attack on corporate greed and on public policy which, over the last several decades, has led to a huge growth in millionaires even as the United States has the highest rate of childhood poverty in the industrialized world. It was a plea for a fundamental change in national priorities, for government policy that reflects the needs of working families, and not just the wealthy and their lobbyists. Finally, Sanders' speech-published here in its entirety with a new introduction by the senator-is a call for action. It is a passionate statement informing us that the only people who will save the middle class of this country is the middle class itself, but only if it is informed, organized, and prepared to take on the enormously powerful special interests dominating Washington.
Download or read book Politics or Principle written by Sarah A. Binder and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2001-09-19 with total page 270 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Is American democracy being derailed by the United States Senate filibuster? Is the filibuster an important right that improves the political process or an increasingly partisan tool that delays legislation and thwarts the will of the majority? Are century-old procedures in the Senate hampering the institution from fulfilling its role on the eve of the 21st century? The filibuster has achieved almost mythic proportions in the history of American politics, but it has escaped a careful, critical assessment for more than 50 years. In this book, Sarah Binder and Steven Smith provide such an assessment as they address the problems and conventional wisdom associated with the Senate's long-standing tradition of extended debate. The authors examine the evolution of the rules governing Senate debate, analyze the consequences of these rules, and evaluate reform proposals. They argue that in an era of unprecedented filibustering and related obstructionism, old habits are indeed undermining the Senate's ability to meet its responsibilities. Binder and Smith scrutinize conventional wisdom about the filibuster—and show that very little of it is true. They focus on five major myths: that unlimited debate is a fundamental right to differentiate the Senate from the House of Representatives; that the Senate's tradition as a deliberative body requires unlimited debate; that the filibuster is reserved for a few issues of the utmost national importance; that few measures are actually killed by the filibuster; and that senators resist changing the rules because of a principled commitment to deliberation. In revising conventional wisdom about the filibuster, Binder and Smith contribute to ongoing debates about the dynamics of institutional change in the American political system. The authors conclude by suggesting reforms intended to enhance the power of determined majorities while preserving the rights of chamber minorities. They advocate, for example, lowering the
Download or read book Defending the Filibuster written by Richard A. Arenberg and published by Indiana University Press. This book was released on 2012-08-21 with total page 285 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Offers a stimulating assessment of the issues surrounding current debates on the filibuster
Download or read book Filibustering in the U S Senate written by and published by Cambria Press. This book was released on with total page 153 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Senate written by Daniel Wirls and published by University of Virginia Press. This book was released on 2021-09-23 with total page 317 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this lively analysis, Daniel Wirls examines the Senate in relation to our other institutions of government and the constitutional system as a whole, exposing the role of the "world’s greatest deliberative body" in undermining effective government and maintaining white supremacy in America. As Wirls argues, from the founding era onward, the Senate constructed for itself an exceptional role in the American system of government that has no firm basis in the Constitution. This self-proclaimed exceptional status is part and parcel of the Senate’s problematic role in the governmental process over the past two centuries, a role shaped primarily by the combination of equal representation among states and the filibuster, which set up the Senate’s clash with modern democracy and effective government and has contributed to the contemporary underrepresentation of minority members. As he explains, the Senate’s architecture, self-conception, and resulting behavior distort rather than complement democratic governance and explain the current gridlock in Washington, D.C. If constitutional changes to our institutions are necessary for better governance, then how should the Senate be altered to be part of the solution rather than part of the problem? This book provides one answer.
Download or read book Congressional Record written by United States. Congress and published by . This book was released on 1971 with total page 1380 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Congressional Record is the official record of the proceedings and debates of the United States Congress. It is published daily when Congress is in session. The Congressional Record began publication in 1873. Debates for sessions prior to 1873 are recorded in The Debates and Proceedings in the Congress of the United States (1789-1824), the Register of Debates in Congress (1824-1837), and the Congressional Globe (1833-1873)
Download or read book Filibusters and Cloture in the Senate written by Congressional Research Congressional Research Service and published by CreateSpace. This book was released on 2014-12-24 with total page 26 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The filibuster is widely viewed as one of the Senate's most characteristic procedural features. Filibustering includes any use of dilatory or obstructive tactics to block a measure by preventing it from coming to a vote. The possibility of filibusters exists because Senate rules place few limits on Senators' rights and opportunities in the legislative process. In particular, a Senator who seeks recognition usually has a right to the floor if no other Senator is speaking, and then that Senator may speak for as long as he or she wishes. Also, there is no motion by which a simple majority of the Senate can stop a debate and allow itself to vote in favor of an amendment, a bill or resolution, or most other debatable questions. Most bills, indeed, are potentially subject to at least two filibusters before the Senate votes on final passage: first, a filibuster on a motion to proceed to the bill's consideration and, second, after the Senate agrees to this motion, a filibuster on the bill itself. Senate Rule XXII, however, known as the cloture rule, enables Senators to end a filibuster on any debatable matter the Senate is considering. Sixteen Senators initiate this process by presenting a motion to end the debate. In most circumstances, the Senate does not vote on this cloture motion until the second day of session after the motion is made. Then, it requires the votes of at least three-fifths of all Senators (normally 60 votes) to invoke cloture. (Invoking cloture on a proposal to amend the Senate's standing rules requires the support of two-thirds of the Senators present and voting, whereas cloture on nominations other than to the U.S. Supreme Court requires a numerical majority.) The primary effect of invoking cloture on most questions is to impose a maximum of 30 additional hours for considering that question. This 30-hour period for consideration encompasses all time consumed by roll call votes, quorum calls, and other actions, as well as the time used for debate. Under cloture, as well, the only amendments Senators can offer are ones that are germane and were submitted in writing before the cloture vote took place. Finally, the presiding officer also enjoys certain additional powers under cloture such as, for example, the power to count to determine whether a quorum is present and to rule amendments, motions, and other actions out of order on the grounds that they are dilatory. The ability of Senators to engage in filibusters has a profound and pervasive effect on how the Senate conducts its business on the floor. In the face of a threatened filibuster, for example, the majority leader may decide not to call a bill up for floor consideration or to defer calling it up if there are other, equally important bills the Senate can consider and pass with less delay. Similarly, the prospect of a filibuster can persuade a bill's proponents to accept changes in the bill that they do not support but that are necessary to prevent an actual filibuster. This report concentrates on the operation of cloture under the general provisions of Senate Rule XXII, paragraph 2. It identifies modifications (including temporary ones) in rules governing debate agreed to at the beginning of the 113th Congress, but the detailed provisions of these changes are addressed in CRS Report R42996, Changes to Senate Procedures at the Start of the 113th Congress Affecting the Operation of Cloture (S.Res. 15 and S.Res. 16), by Elizabeth Rybicki. This report will be updated as events warrant.
Download or read book Filibusters and Cloture in the Senate written by and published by . This book was released on 2003 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The right of Senators to speak on the floor at great lengthâ€"and so to filibusterâ€"is the single most defining characteristic of the Senate as a legislative body. The possibility of filibusters derives from the absence of any effective Senate rules that limit the number or length of floor speeches. The Senate's rules provide that, in most cases, a Senator who seeks recognition has a right to the floor if no other Senator is speaking, and that Senator then may speak for as long as he or she wishes. There is no motion by which a simple majority of the Senate can stop a debate and allow the Senate to vote in favor of an amendment, a bill or resolution, or any other debatable question. Almost every bill actually is subject to two potential filibusters before the Senate votes on whether to pass it: first, a filibuster on a motion to proceed to the bill's consideration; and second, after the Senate agrees to this motion, a filibuster on the bill itself. Senate Rule XXII enables Senators to end a filibuster by invoking cloture on whatever debatable matter it is considering. Sixteen Senators initiate this process by presenting a motion to end the debate. The Senate does not vote on this cloture motion until the second day after the day on which the motion is made. Then it usually requires the votes of at least three-fifths of all Senators, or at least 60 votes, to invoke cloture. Invoking cloture on a proposal to amend the Senate's standing rules requires the support of two-thirds of the Senators present and voting. The primary effect of invoking cloture on a question is to impose a maximum of 30 additional hours for considering that question. This 30-hour period for consideration encompasses all time consumed by rollcall votes, quorum calls, and other actions, as well as the time used for debate. During this 30-hour period, each Senator may speak for no more than one hour apiece (although several Senators can have additional time yielded to them). Under cloture, the only amendments that Senators can offer are amendments that are germane and that were submitted in writing before the cloture vote took place. The presiding officer also enjoys certain additional powers under cloture: for example, to count to determine whether a quorum is present, and to rule amendments, motions, and other actions out of order on the grounds that they are dilatory. The ability of Senators to engage in filibusters has a profound and pervasive effect on how the Senate conducts its business on the floor. In the face of a threatened filibuster, for example, the majority leader may decide not to call a bill up for floor consideration, or to defer calling it up if there are other, equally important bills that the Senate can consider and pass without undue delay. Similarly, the prospect of a filibuster can persuade a bill's proponents to accept changes in the bill that they do not support but that are necessary to prevent the threat of a filibuster from becoming a reality. In January 2001, the Senate agreed to S.Res. 8, adjusting the Senate's organization and procedures during the 107th Congress. Discussions of pertinent provisions of this resolution appear in italics.
Download or read book The Senate Syndrome written by Steven S. Smith and published by University of Oklahoma Press. This book was released on 2014-03-20 with total page 455 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With its rock-bottom approval ratings, acrimonious partisan battles, and apparent inability to do its legislative business, the U.S. Senate might easily be deemed unworthy of attention, if not downright irrelevant. This book tells us that would be a mistake. Because the Senate has become the place where the policy-making process most frequently stalls, any effective resolution to our polarized politics demands a clear understanding of how the formerly august legislative body once worked and how it came to the present crisis. Steven S. Smith provides that understanding in The Senate Syndrome. Like the Senate itself, Smith’s account is grounded in history. Countering a cacophony of inexpert opinion and a widespread misunderstanding of political and legislative history, the book fills in a world of missing information—about debates among senators concerning fundamental democratic processes and the workings of institutional rules, procedures, and norms. And Smith does so in a clear and engaging manner. He puts the present problems of the Senate—the “Senate syndrome,” as he calls them—into historical context by explaining how particular ideas and procedures were first framed and how they transformed with the times. Along the way he debunks a number of myths about the Senate, many perpetuated by senators themselves, and makes some pointed observations about the media’s coverage of Congress. The Senate Syndrome goes beyond explaining such seeming technicalities as the difference between regular filibusters and post-cloture filibusters, the importance of chair rulings, the changing role of the parliamentarian, and the debate over whether appeals of points of order should be subject to cloture margins, to show why understanding them matters. At stake is resolution of the Senate syndrome, and the critical underlying struggle between majority rule and minority rights in American policy making.
Download or read book The Senate Filibuster written by Emmet J. Bondurant and published by . This book was released on 2010 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The notion that the Framers of the Constitution intended to allow a minority in the U.S. Senate to exercise a veto power over legislation and presidential appointments is not only profoundly undemocratic, it is also a myth. The overwhelming trend of law review articles have assumed that because the Constitution grants to each house the power to make its own rules, the Senate filibuster rule is immune from constitutional attack. This Article takes an opposite position based on the often overlooked history of the filibuster, the text of the Constitution and the relevant court precedents which demonstrate that the constitutionality of the Senate filibuster rule is not, as many have assumed, a political question that is beyond the jurisdiction of the federal courts. This Article proceeds in four parts. Part I traces the history of the filibuster, documents the recent surge in filibusters and explains why the rules of the Senate, including the filibuster rule, cannot be amended by a simple majority vote as can the rules of the House of Representatives. The Senate filibuster rule is responsible for much of the partisan gridlock in Congress, and has replaced majority rule with a tyranny of the minority. The Senate is incapable of reforming its rules for the same reasons that state legislatures and Congress refused to reform of the apportionment of state legislative and congressional districts. If reform is to come, it will not come from within the Senate, and can only come from the courts as occurred in the case of congressional and state legislative districts, the one-house veto, and the line-item veto cases. Part II examines the historical evidence that reveals that there was no “right” of unlimited debate at the time the Constitution was adopted and that the filibuster is nothing more than an unintended consequence of a decision by the Senate to delete the previous question motion from its rules in 1806. That decision was based on the naïve assumption that the rule was unnecessary because Senators were gentlemen who would never attempt to obstruct the business of the Senate by abusing the privilege of debate. This Part examines the filibuster in the light of the debates at the Federal Convention, the Federalists Papers and the express language of Article I the Constitution all of which were premised on the democratic principle of majority rule. When the Framers of the Constitution intended to condition action on a vote or more than a simple majority of the House or Senate, they did so expressly in six carefully defined exceptions - and significantly rejected the only proposals at the Federal Convention that would have prohibited a simple majority from passing legislation prior to its presentation to the President. Although defenders of the filibuster argue that the Constitution gives each house the power to make its own rules, this power is not absolute. The Supreme Court ruled over a century ago that this rule-making power does not include the power to adopt rules that violate other provisions of the Constitution. Finally, this Part also argues that Senate Rule V, which provides that the rules of the Senate to continue from one Senate to the next and prohibits the Senate from amending its own rules without a two-thirds vote, is also unconstitutional. In Part III, I confront the skeptics who contend that the federal courts are barred by the separation of powers and the political question doctrines from ruling on the merits of the constitutionality of the rules of the Senate. The Supreme Court ruled in 1892, however, that the question of whether a House rule violated other provisions of the Constitution was a matter for the federal courts. Part III also addresses the issue of standing on which previous challenges to the Senate filibuster rule have foundered. This Part demonstrates that there are a number of potential plaintiffs with standing, including the Vice President, sitting members of the Senate and the House, individuals who would have been direct beneficiaries of measures that passed the House but died in the Senate, presidential appointees whose nominations were denied a confirmation vote as a result of actual or threatened filibusters, and organizations such as Common Cause. These individuals and entities have all been directly injured and would have standing to challenge the Senate filibuster rule. Part III also explains that the courts are fully capable of granting complete relief without “rewriting” the rules of the Senate, simply by the entry of a declaratory judgment declaring the supermajority vote portions of Rule XXII unconstitutional. Part IV address the common arguments espoused in favor of the filibuster, such as the contention that it prevents the passage of hastily adopted legislation, promotes compromise, and prevents the “tyranny of the majority.” I also address the unfounded contentions that “we have always had a filibuster” and “it's only a rule of procedure.” Lastly, I answer the argument that the “remedial discretion” doctrine, a doctrine unique to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, would doom any legal challenge to the filibuster. The filibuster is unconstitutional. The arguments to the contrary are weak. And the courts have both the power and duty to strike down the Senate Rules that conflict with the Constitution.
Download or read book Strom Thurmond and the Politics of Southern Change written by Nadine Cohodas and published by Mercer University Press. This book was released on 1994 with total page 614 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Reprint of the Simon & Schuster edition originally published in 1993. Annotation copyright Book News, Inc. Portland, Or.
Download or read book The American Senate written by Lindsay Rogers and published by . This book was released on 1968 with total page 285 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Filibustered written by Senator Jeff Merkley and published by The New Press. This book was released on 2024-01-09 with total page 155 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The U.S. Senator from Oregon who is leading the fight to restore the talking filibuster explains how changing just one rule could save our democracy In a compelling and powerfully argued book, Senator Jeff Merkley and his longtime chief of staff tell the insiders’ story of how the Senate used to work and how the filibuster came to cripple the self-styled “World’s Greatest Deliberative Body” with paralyzing gridlock. And they make the surprising case that restoring a modified version of the old-style, talking filibuster may just be our democracy’s path back from the brink. For nearly two centuries, the Senate designed by the Founders served the purpose they envisioned: it was a deliberative legislative body where the nation’s thorniest challenges were hashed out. Senators had the ability to speak at length and offer any manner of amendments to influence bills, and then when all had had a say, the Senate voted. Senators who objected to passing a bill could wage a defiant filibuster—in the spirit of fictional Senator Smith who talked until he collapsed in order to block a corrupt railroad deal in the classic 1939 film Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. But at the end of the day, nearly all legislation, amendments, and nominations went to a vote, and the majority prevailed. Today, however, thanks to abuse of a fifty-year-old reform intended to make it easier for the Senate to pass legislation, the exceedingly difficult, rare filibuster has morphed, plunging the Senate into dysfunction and threatening the very foundations of our democracy. Now, the minority party can simply declare a “no-talk” filibuster, insisting on a supermajority of sixty votes to pass nearly any bill or a lengthy process to confirm any of the president’s nominees—giving themselves a veto over the majority’s agenda. Wildly popular bills languish, judgeships and administrative posts remain unfilled, but ordinary citizens can’t see why because the obstruction all takes place behind closed doors. Filibustered! combines a marvelous romp through key moments in filibuster history—from the first filibuster in 1841 through Southern Dixiecrat filibusters of civil rights legislation, up through Mitch McConnell’s transformation of the filibuster into a routine tool of perennial gridlock—with firsthand accounts of recent high-profile legislative fights, and a compelling argument that the key to the Senate’s future may be found in its past.
