Fixing the Filibuster
Political scientists Jonathan Krasno and Gregory Robinson offer this modest proposal in Roll Call. In essence, they seek to preserve the tradition of unlimited debate, but make it harder to have those debates. Their three-pronged solution:
Make them vote…Filibustering Senators are the ones trying to prevent the Senate from voting. It would make more sense to require them, after some hours of debate, to assemble 41 votes to continue, rather than the other way around. Our compromise is to allow three-fifths of Senators present and voting to invoke cloture, making votes against just as important as votes in favor.
Make voting easier…allow a filibuster’s opponents to hold a cloture vote with little delay or warning. That would….force a filibuster’s supporters to be constantly at the ready to fend off cloture whether a vote comes at 3 p.m. or 3 a.m.
Reduce debate times…This would streamline the process and give the majority some leverage to strike deals to forgo filibusters in exchange for prolonged debate.
Not that they’re hopeful that these steps will be taken any time soon:
Unfortunately, the Senate’s rules make changes like these all but impossible.
Comments
Kudos to Krasno and Robinson for a very interesting column. Let me suggest that their prospects are not necessarily as hopeless as they expect. Like the Republicans in 2005, the Democrats could threaten some drastic, unorthodox reform as a ploy to induce the Republicans to adopt the Krasno-Robinson reform. Sound implausible? Robert “Big Daddy” Byrd did this in 1979—threaten major, majoritarian reforms as a means to induce bargaining. Essentially, the majority shifts the reversionary point so that it is not just the status quo rules but some combination of the status quo rules (retained with probability p) and the if-you-make-me-mad-we’ll-make-some-REAL-changes option (realized with probability 1-p). It would help if the Democrats (like the 2005 GOP) could talk tough and sound like they are serious; as p increases, the more likely that the minority would accept moderate reforms.
Posted by: Greg Koger | February 5, 2010 11:12 AM