The Filibuster: Friend or Foe?

Senate Democrats, liberal interest groups, and their allies in the media are growing increasingly angry at the perpetual filibuster threat posed by the Republican minority. Over the weekend, Sen. Tom Harkin (D-IA) announced plans to reintroduce legislation that would effectively eliminate the filibuster.

To be fair to Senator Harkin, he did introduce similar legislation in 1995 when the Democrats were in the minority. However, news stories and op-eds questioning the wisdom of the filibuster are more prevalent now that the Democrats control both chambers of Congress. On the CBS News Blog, Bob Fuss laments the filibuster in an article entitled "How Filibusters are Strangling the Senate." The liberal columnist Paul Krugman makes a similar argument in his New York Times column. But these columnists didn't object when Democrats used the filibuster during the Bush Administration. This is because the left-leaning media is indignant that the Republican filibuster could derail a liberal agenda, but were all too happy too see a Democrat filibuster undermine a conservative agenda. 

This kind of transparent bias and hypocrisy extends beyond the politics of the filibuster. TV anchors and pundits are quick to echo the Democratic Party line that Republicans are "obstructionists" and label the Republican Party the "party of no." Yet when Democrats were in the minority, Republicans also accused Democrats of obstructionism and the media did not legitimize that talking point.   

In 2005, after the Democrats successfully filibustered ten of George Bush's high-profile nominees to the federal courts of appeals, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist threatened to invoke the nuclear option, which would have required a simple majority to approve a judicial nominee. The Democrats and most in the mainstream press cried foul. Now the tables have turned, and the Republicans (and centrist Democrats) use the filibuster threat, while Democrats ponder some variation of the nuclear option. But as Byron York points out in the Washington Examiner, there is a major substantive distinction between filibustering judicial nominees and filibustering legislation:

The argument was that the judicial filibuster undermined the Senate's constitutional responsibility to give advice and consent on the president's judicial nominations. When legislation is filibustered, it's possible for a bill's sponsors to make changes that will satisfy opponents. But what happens when a nominee is filibustered? No advice and consent. The Constitution does not require the Senate to pass a national health care bill, but it does require it to confirm or deny the president's appointees...So Republicans came up with what was called the "nuclear option"... GOP lawmakers made clear at the time that they were not going after the legislative filibuster...(emphasis added)

It is understandable for politicians to support a parliamentary tactic when it advances their agenda, and oppose it when it does not. It makes sense for those in the majority to label the recalcitrant minority "obstructionist," and then when political fortunes are reversed, turn around and obstruct. This is somewhat hypocritical, but such is the art of politics that self-interest usually trumps consistency. What is not acceptable or intellectually honest is for so many in the media to bemoan the filibuster when it threatens a liberal agenda and celebrate it when it hinders a conservative one.