Educate me: How enforceable is the filibuster?

[TragicMonkey]

Dear Visitor, thank you for your inquiry concerning our operating procedures. All policies and practices are created, operated, and enforced by the residents themselves. Thank you for your patronage of the New Bedlam Institute for Psychotic Sociopaths. Love, USA.

PS: If you have the time when you are visiting you may wish to include on your tour our sister facility, it's a groundbreaking banana plantation staffed entirely by monkeys.

 

[JoeMorgue]

I actually do think this matters though.

"Government is big, government is ineffective, government is in fact bad and makes thing worst" is a very toxic attitude, one which is the cause of a lot of problems in regards to, well *gestures broadly.*

But one (of many) reason it exists is because the a lot of government does just seem to go out of their way to make things not just inefficient, but like anti-efficient.

 

[Lurch]

Bills occasionally get talked out in the UK parliament. Preventing legislation progressing based on procedure is not unheard of. During the end of the Brexit long parliament the whole thing descended into haggling over procedure. It's different, certainly, but the basic phenomenon can and does happen. I'm not sure that this is quite as unique as you think.

The issue at the moment in the US Senate seems to me to be more the lack of a majority due to Sinema and Manchin. Getting legislation through a chamber in which you have less than half the votes is always tricky. This kind of thing happens all the time in the UK, and I'm sure widely around the world, whenever there is a weak government with a razor thin majority.

In numerous other democracies there are more than two Parties, from which coalitions can be formed. A two-Party system has a certain inflexibility, particularly where partisan calcification has set in.

 

[shuttlt]

In numerous other democracies there are more than two Parties, from which coalitions can be formed. A two-Party system has a certain inflexibility, particularly where partisan calcification has set in.

Perhaps. I was disagreeing with the idea that procedural ways for a minority to prevent the passing of a bill in the manner of the filibuster was unique. As I say, it does sometimes happen in the UK. The pros and cons of first past the post vs other systems is a topic in itself.

 

[theprestige]

Without getting into the details of what the filibuster is, or what cloture means, it seems like Norman Alexander's question boils down to, "is there any way to force the Senate to vote on a proposal if the Senate doesn't want to vote on it?"

And the answer that is "no, there isn't. How would that even work, anyway? And why on earth would you want it to work that way?"

 

[JoeMorgue]

It's not like voting on things is the Senate's job or anything.

Me and the other 4 IT Techs can't decide to not troubleshoot or fix computers and go "What? But it was a majority opinion among the 5 of us."

 

[Norman Alexander]

If the majority of the Senate don't want to change this rule, what are you proposing?

That the US Senate adhere to the same rules that every other civilised bicameral parliament uses: Majority vote on measures calls the result, and get on with it.

And if (what you consider to be) the "wrong" party take the majority in the House in an election and start crashing the country as a result, then so be it. You got what you voted for.

 

[Norman Alexander]

The filibuster isn't like... a thing. It's not like a Veto that's actually in the Constitution. It's not a law.

It's a procedural thing. To oversimply it some (but not a lot) while it's been part of Senate procedures in some form for a long time, what we now think of the filibuster in the modern sense was pretty much just created in 1975 with the "Way to keep the Party in power in check" subtext moved to the text.

It's not some ancient hallowed tradition of the Democratic process that goes to the Greek Forum. But much in the same way an American Tradition is anything that happened to a Baby Boomer twice, anything that happened to Congress in the 60/s70s from the filibuster to the goddamn candy desk is treated like some vaulted part of its soul.

It's procedural trick. It's a "Rule of Order." Nothing more. But Congress, the Senate especially, loves them some dog and pony show because more than America, more than the law, more than themselves Congress loves reminding everyone how important they are and they've long thought the best way of doing that is to make everything they do as ponderous and procedure filled and anti-efficient as possible to the point where I doubt they can ask to go to the bathroom without performing an entire Japanese Tea Ceremony.

Beyond that... it's just absurd. It's literally "I win because I won't shut up and stop talking." It's so childish. It's one step removed at best from holding your breath until you get your mumbling under breath "A moron says what?"

And hell it's not even that anymore. At least Thurmond actually had to talk for 24 hours straight to try and stop the Civil Rights Act from happening (shakes head) but now they can just "Not technically according to Hoyle yield the floor in accordance with Section 4, Subsection B of the Wasting Everyone's Time Act of 1975" and skate off to the Congressional Cafeteria for Taco Tuesday.

It's a Gish Gallop given an air of unearned respectability. Small wonder the Right is in love with now.

That's what it appears as from afar. Which suggests that it may be in the hands of the Speaker, as the master of the House and in the cause of the Senate actually make decisions for bloody once, to unilaterally ditch the rules and impose his/her own. And the fairer the better. Because the filibuster is now clearly unfair. And brazen cowards and recalcitrants like Mitch will cheerfully use it to mire the House for their own nefarious purposes without a single scruple in sight.

Now, of course, it is entirely possible that should the GOP take back the House that they will use the same mechanism to set the rules in their favour. Which is why perhaps the first act of the "filibuster-free Senate" would be to legalise the rules they operate under - make it VERY hard to crank things back to the bad old days.

Yep, I have a dream!

 

[Norman Alexander]

What is this supposed to mean? The Senate operates under rules that it chooses. It can and does change those rules by majority vote as it wishes. There is no outside authority that can make it do something else. Who do you think would be the "big brother?"

The American people. Amend the constitution, is one option.

ETA: You could also try changing the standing Senate rules that votes are counted of those present at the time of the vote, and no substitutes or proxies allowed, and a quorum of three. Then just keep an eye on attendance from time to time, and get stuff passed when the GOP all bugger off to long lunches, boondoggles, etc.

 

[Norman Alexander]

I actually do think this matters though.

"Government is big, government is ineffective, government is in fact bad and makes thing worst" is a very toxic attitude, one which is the cause of a lot of problems in regards to, well *gestures broadly.*

But one (of many) reason it exists is because the a lot of government does just seem to go out of their way to make things not just inefficient, but like anti-efficient.

The USA is not alone in this, of course. A lot of us Aussies can point to great pile of parliamentary disasters and intentional shipwrecks in Canberra. And there are a whole bunch of tricks and traps for young players in the game of parliamentary debate, delaying tactics, procedural games, etc. No doubt there will be many similar instances in the UK and Canada as well.

But one difference we do have to the USA: It's a majority vote in our upper house (also called the Senate, btw) to get a result. No filibuster.

 

[theprestige]

It's not like voting on things is the Senate's job or anything.

It's certainly not the Senate's job to just mindlessly vote on anything and everything anyone can imagine. In fact a large part of their job is to decide what to vote on, and what not to vote on. Too many laws is just as much of a problem as too few laws.

Ultimately each Senator answers to nobody but their own constituents, about whether they're doing their job satisfactorily.

 

[theprestige]

That's what it appears as from afar. Which suggests that it may be in the hands of the Speaker, as the master of the House and in the cause of the Senate actually make decisions for bloody once, to unilaterally ditch the rules and impose his/her own.

The Speaker of the House of Representatives does not have the authority to impose rules on the Senate.

The President of the Senate does not have the authority to impose rules on the Senate.

The Senate Majority Leader does not have authority to impose rules on the Senate.

The only way to impose rules on the Senate is if the Senate agrees to the imposition. Which they won't, for obvious reasons.

I get that you're frustrated - probably much more so than necessary, given your remove from the issues - but the remedy you're describing is a complete break from reality. This is not the way.

 

[Hercules56]

takes 51 votes to change Senate rules.

current rules state any 1 Senator can stall start of debate or start of voting on a bill, for as long as he likes. Only way to stop this, is through cloture. Current rule for cloture requires 60 votes.

this can be changed once a year.

This rule is NOWHERE in the USC. It started in the early 1800s.

 

[dudalb]

Here is what I can tell you

The filibuster, in the form used by the US Senate, is the most undemocratic rule of procedure in any western democracy. It effectively means that the Senate minority gets to dictate the terms to the majority, go directly against the will of the people, and blame the majority for their failure to pass legislation, because most people are too stupid to understand - they only see promises made and broken.

In every other western democracy, a one seat/vote majority passes the legislation - which is as it should be.

I think kwe need to get rid of the filibuster, but not sure that simple majority should be the rule for every piece of legislation.

 

[Bob001]

The American people. Amend the constitution, is one option.

ETA: You could also try changing the standing Senate rules that votes are counted of those present at the time of the vote, and no substitutes or proxies allowed, and a quorum of three. Then just keep an eye on attendance from time to time, and get stuff passed when the GOP all bugger off to long lunches, boondoggles, etc.

Amending the Constitution is an arduous process that ultimately requires the approval of three-fourths of the states. It has only happened 27 times in history, the last time almost 30 years ago. And since in this particular case, the filibuster was not created by the Constitution, what's to amend?

You don't seem to understand that the Senate makes its own rules. It can change them or ignore them whenever it likes. A majority likes the rules they have now. Who do you think is going to impose all these things that you think the Senate should do?

 

[Hercules56]

I think kwe need to get rid of the filibuster, but not sure that simple majority should be the rule for every piece of legislation.

We need to decide if we really want Senators to be able to stall a bill. And if so, how much can they stall it?

 

[Joecool]

We need to decide if we really want Senators to be able to stall a bill. And if so, how much can they stall it?

It's a double-edged sword because the very people who are in favor of a simple majority to pass legislation will be the very ones decrying how awful it is if they no longer hold the majority.

There is no filibuster for SCOTUS nominations as the filibuster for this process was scuttled by Harry Reid and the Dems. Then they screamed foul when the simple majority got Amy Coney Barrett into SCOTUS. (I may have over simplified what Harry Reid etal did to make these changes)

 

[TragicMonkey]

This sort of crap will be resolved when we eliminate human politicians and have it all run by AI. The AIs will draw up their calculations and vote accordingly, and get through several million bills an hour. Parity will matter, party will not.

 

[crescent]

...
This rule is NOWHERE in the USC. It started in the early 1800s.

Sort of. Back then it was harder to start a filibuster, and it had to be a "talking" filibuster. That is, a Senator had to stand there and talk, and talk, and talk. The filibuster lasted as long as someone could keep talking - although I think it might have been permissible to tag team the talking with more than one Senator. While they were talking, the Senate could not be doing much else that required the full Senate - no debate on other bills, no votes on other bills. Everything stopped. Back then it took 67 votes to end the debate and move forward.

The current no-debate 60 vote filibuster dates from the 1970's. It was intended to break the gridlock caused by the remaining Southern segregationists filibustering any and all social justice and civil rights bills. Back then, there were fewer issues that fell perfectly along party lines like they do now - those southern segregationists for example, were Democrats who were often filibustering bills that were popular with the majority of Democrats but which were increasingly unpopular with Republicans, although many Republicans still supported such legislation. It was thought that finding 60 votes, with votes coming from both sides of the aisle, would be easy.

And nowadays, the filibuster is pretty painless to implement. No talking needed, no holdups of other senate business.

They didn't anticipate the number of bills that would eventually end up with Party-line votes. 60 votes gets much harder when party discipline means that more and more bills get all or nothing votes from each party.

The one compromise suggestion is to go back to a filibuster that hurts. One that gums up EVERYTHING the senate does until it is resolved. Put them in a situation where the vote on this or that bill, or they can't do anything at all. It would force them to prioritize which bills to block, instead of the current situation in which parties can block pretty well everything.

 

[theprestige]

It's not like voting on things is the Senate's job or anything.

Me and the other 4 IT Techs can't decide to not troubleshoot or fix computers and go "What? But it was a majority opinion among the 5 of us."

I'm sure that has entirely to do with the rules of your workplace, that you and the other techs agreed to when you took the job.

In the IT workplaces I've had experience with, work gets deferred or denied all the time by consensus of the workers, or of the managers, involved in doing the work. Sure, a lot of times a senior manager will issue a fiat ruling about what work will be done. But a lot of times they'll delegate to the team and accept our consensus decision.

Once again, an argument by analogy fails.