Harkin Floats Breaking GOP Filibuster by Attrition
This from Tom Harkin is going to be music to a lot of people’s ears:
“If the Republicans want to stay here this Saturday and Sunday to read the bill, then let them stay here,” Harkin said, adding that Democrats would hold a “live quorum,” where the sergeant at arms requests the presence of all absent senators.
“I’ll tell you, we’re going to do something like that,” Harkin said. “We are planning to do something that would require Republicans to be there 24 hours a day, and if they leave the floor, we’ll ask unanimous consent to dispense with the reading, and that’ll be the end of it.”
I’ll believe this when I see it. Breaking a filibuster via attrition is more difficult than is generally realized. The minority needs to have at least one guy available at all times to hold the floor and keep talking. The majority, meanwhile, needs to have basically all its guys on hand at all times. Otherwise, the minority can “note the absence of a quorum” and everything stops until everyone can be dragged into the chamber. It’s a bigger pain, in other words, for the majority than for the minority which is why you generally don’t see it attempted.
15 Responses to “Harkin Floats Breaking GOP Filibuster by Attrition”
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November 16th, 2009 at 4:14 pm
This post seems to be confusing two kinds of issues. The old fashioned filibuster that allowed Senators to talk the matter to death and read the phone book is dead replaced by the 60 vote requirement. Harkin’s claim is that the votes are there to break the filibuster.
What Harkin is addressing here is a different delaying tactic in which the Republicans call for reading the bill before it can be voted on. Since nobody is going to sit through the reading, this serves no legitimate purpose except taking up time. And it is this delaying tactic that Harkin is talking about breaking. But it is not an endless delay. It is just a delay as long as it takes fast readers to read the bill while nobody pays attention to them.
November 16th, 2009 at 4:18 pm
Also, I think what Harkin really wants to do is publicize the filibuster for PR reasons. I’m not sure if he’s actually expecting that it will break the filibuster, but “calling the bluff” as it were could have a payoff in terms of turning the discussion to Republican obstructionism and getting back some momentum for the generic Democrat in polls.
November 16th, 2009 at 4:19 pm
Really appreciate the continued focus on breaking filibuster. No mechanism will work if (50 or 51 or 60 or 67) Senators won’t support it. Is anyone asking Senators to take a stand? How about some full-time journalists working on that?
November 16th, 2009 at 4:22 pm
You should probably read the article more closely. Harkin’s not talking about passing the bill without a final cloture vote. He’s talking about subverting the Republican stall tactic of actually reading the entire bill on the Senate floor, so that final cloture vote can come a few days/weeks sooner.
Also, your last paragraph is incorrect. At no point does the filibustering party have to hold the floor and keep talking. You can always just repeatedly suggest the absence of a quorum, even if all 100 are sitting there. You need 50 Democrats sitting on the floor 24 hours a day or else the absence of a quorum is noted and the Senate closes. And if you do have them, all that would happen is roll calls for hours on end, not the Strom Thurmond-like speeches (which even back then were unnecessary, but he wanted to grandstand).
November 16th, 2009 at 4:23 pm
This analysis misses the politically useful picture of Republicans reading from a phone book in order to block health care reform.
November 16th, 2009 at 4:26 pm
Agreed–this is not about breaking a filibuster. But more generally there seems to be real confusion about whether a real filibuster is possible. The conventional wisdom seems to be that Reid can force an old-fashioned filibuster if he wants to, but Reid seems to think he can’t. This might be a good opportunity for some “clarification” in that regard, if you know what I mean.
November 16th, 2009 at 4:31 pm
Um, Matt, the entire reason this can be attrition is that Harkin is (FINALLY) proposing to use the coercive powers that Congress actually does possess.
The crucial point here is that Sergeant of Arms is going to be used to ask every absent senator to show up.
November 16th, 2009 at 4:33 pm
In fact, this is something Congress ought to have used during the Bush years.
If you’re an Executive Branch official that refuses to testify, you can be forced to show up, and if you refuse to answer questions, you can be held in contempt, meaning you get to spend time in jail.
November 16th, 2009 at 4:36 pm
Reid should have a plan B in store (reconciliation) just in case.
I think the Democrats will win their cloture vote at the end of the day, but I’d never say never. I’d sleep more comfortably at night knowing they can kill a filibuster come what may.
November 16th, 2009 at 4:48 pm
Imagine the good PR you could get by having supporters of health care reform deliver milk and cookies to the Democratic Senators.
November 16th, 2009 at 4:56 pm
So let me understand this: the democrats can’t handle pulling some all nighters to break the republicans’ backs ? What a bunch of useless pussies.
November 16th, 2009 at 6:23 pm
I thought they changed the filibuster so that it could at maximum only take half of a day? Thus my understanding was that regardless of how long the filibuster lasted, other things would still be brought to the floor and the senate would essentially abandon all hope of ever voting on the bill…
November 16th, 2009 at 6:34 pm
I started calling my Senators to ask how they felt, and learned 2 things:
1) Email to the national office via their online forms is recommended approach.
2) Phrasing the question is not so easy and probably matters. Here’s what I came up with:
“Currently most major legislation requires the support of 60 senators. Does the Senator support changing Senate rules to allow a simple majority of Senators to better implement their agenda?”
Suggestions for improving this language would be awesome. Also, how about surfing to your Senators’ sites at .senate.gov and putting the question to them?
November 16th, 2009 at 6:56 pm
Key is you need unanimous consent to suspend the quorum call and once you have a quorum the Senate can conduct business
This is a cots in cloakroom plan
November 16th, 2009 at 7:12 pm
This is why the filibuster threshold needs to be changed back to a percentage of Senators present rather than the current percentage of the entire Senate. Then the minority would also need to keep all their guys present all the time and ending a filibuster by attrition would become a reasonable option once again.