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 Since the Senate gives an equal voice to each state, the
filibuster is a valued resource to assure that all states have the opportunity
to deliberate equally. It empowers each state with the same political capital
and it enables the minority party to remain engaged in legislation as long as
they wish.
“The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on occasions.” – Thomas
Jefferson
Frank Capra’s 1939 film “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” exemplifies how one naive
man, Jimmy Stewart, AKA Jefferson Smith, ends up in the Senate and fights
corruption with the filibuster. This is a perfect visual, nonpartisan metaphor
that shows how one man can hold Congress at bay until they make changes in
corrupt legislation. The movie is ostentatiously devoid of political
affiliations.
The Washington Press Club screened the film at Constitution Hall with a number
of congressmen, senators, and Supreme Court justices in attendance. Frank Capra
claimed that over a third of them walked out before the film ever ended. Senate
Majority Leader, Democrat Alben Barkley, said the movie was "silly and stupid"
and complained that it "made the Senate look like a bunch of crooks."
Joseph Kennedy, U.S. Ambassador to the United Kingdom, sent a
cable to Capra claiming that “Mr. Smith ridiculed democracy and would do untold
harm to America's prestige in Europe." He begged Capra to withdraw it from
European distribution. But Capra aired it anyway.
“I was the enemy of the major studio. I believed in one man and one film. There
are no rules in filmmaking.” – Frank Capra
Most people don’t know how filibusters are used today. Senators use procedural
delays, or simply “silent filibusters,” expressing the intention to delay and
debate legislation to the Senate majority leader. Fearing lack of support, he
doesn’t bring the bill to the floor until there is bipartisan consent.
Senators of all stripes have always been sensitive to changing the filibuster
rule. They are always aware the majority becoming the minority is one election
away. That in itself is a sobering thought! All attempts to end the filibuster
have traditionally led to outrage and consternation by the minority.
As soon as the final tally in Georgia's special election awarded the Senate to
Democrats, President Joe Biden declared war on the filibuster. He claimed it was
“a relic of the Jim Crow era!” Yet Biden used it himself for years in the
Senate. Al Sharpton said anyone who supports it is a racist. But it was the
Democrats, not the GOP, who abused it to prevent the passage of Congressional
Republican Civil Rights legislation.
“The filibuster is a dangerous tool that the minority party uses as a means to
barter.” – Joe Biden
House progressives Cori Bush (D-MO), Ro Khanna (D-CA), Eric Swalwell (D-CA), and
Senators Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Ed Markey (D-MA) and Joe Biden and Kamala
Harris all want to ban the filibuster. They say it prevents the passage of
federalizing elections, green energy legislation and strict climate change laws.
They are calling Democrats who are against this, enemies of the party.
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Sen. Dick Durbin recently said. “We must stop
holding this Senate hostage. We can no longer allow arcane rules to
block the will of the people. I urge my colleagues to defend
democracy by making the changes needed.” Yet in 2018, Durbin, told
Huffington Post the filibuster was a necessity to “protect the voice
of the people. And making changes to the filibuster would destroy
democracy.”
Democrats filibustered the GOP when they had a
trifecta with the House, Senate and presidency. They filibustered a
COVID-relief bill and Tim Scott’s criminal-justice bill; two of
many. The Senate GOP had to end debate on judicial nominees and
break filibusters 314 times under President Donald Trump.
Every other president in U.S. history has faced only a combined 244
roll-call votes over a filibuster.
Progressives claim they can’t pass bills to fund roads, protect
migrant children or to end election fraud but there are no such
bills in Congress. Their current infrastructure, immigration and
voting bills are stuffed with policies that empower the government
and abridge states rights.
“It is terrifying to think what so many voters will allow these
progressives to do to them.” – Sen. John Kennedy, R-LA
The left has shown no inclination they wish to work within the
established parameters of Congress. In 2017, 30 Democrats signed a
letter written by Republican Sen. Susan Collins defending the
filibuster as an imperative tool in maintaining the “deliberative”
composure of the legislature. Now they have control of both chambers
the filibuster is anti-democratic and a racist Republican tactic?
Napoleon once said, "In politics, an absurdity is
not a handicap." Led by President Lyndon B. Johnson, the party that
abused the filibuster for years to prevent the passage of Civil
Rights legislation now claims the filibuster is a racist rule? This
is the party that forced a $2 trillion progressive wish list through
Congress without a single GOP vote? The left's desire to ban the
filibuster is to silence the voice of half of America.
There are few if any legal prerequisites for holding office in
America, and Jefferson Smith set a stellar example of why we need
less career politicians and more Mr. Smiths in Washington. He is an
iconic small town guy, picked by the political machine as least
likely to upset the establishment. By the time he arrived in
Washington, he knew the rules and used them to benefit his
constituents.
This continued hypocritical flip-flopping by the left to tie
everything they do not like to racism should concern all Americans.
Every member of Congress that claims a parliamentary technique is
racist because it prevents them from disenfranchising the minority
must be censured. Changing the rules of the Senate to empower one
political party over another is antithetical to republican
democracy.
“Once a government is committed to the principle of silencing the
voice of opposition, it has only one way to go, and that is down the
path of increasingly repressive measures.” – Harry S. Truman
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