Don't stop me if you've heard this before. Because you probably have.
There's a move afoot in the U.S. Senate to reform the filibuster.
But this time — No, really, wait! Don't leave! — this time, it might actually happen.
All seven newly elected Democratic senators and newly elected independent Angus King of Maine have pledged support for changes in the rules to curb the power of a 41-vote minority of senators in the 100-member chamber to effortlessly bottle up and kill legislation.
Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada, who opposed and voted against the idea at the start of the last Congress in early 2011, when it fell seven votes short of passage, has recanted and thrown his weight behind the effort.
"It's going to be close, but I think we'll have the votes," said Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, the Democratic whip, in an interview Tuesday. "These new members are shaking their heads and asking, 'What's the point of serving in a body that grinds to a halt over nothing?' And I can't argue with them.
"We've had 380 filibusters in the last six years alone," Durbin said. "We used to reserve them for rare matters of historical importance."
By "we," he meant his predecessors. By 1997, when Durbin joined the Senate, it was already common for members of the minority party to declare a filibuster, thus in effect raising the threshold for a bill to pass from a simple majority to a three-fifths majority — 60 votes.
Rules changes had long ago done away with the necessity for nonstop speechifying of the sort made famous by actor Jimmy Stewart in the 1939 Hollywood classic "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington," and made infamous by Sen. Strom Thurmond in his 1957 marathon oration against a civil rights bill.
The filibuster had become as easy to use as it was to abuse. But it had its supporters.
"The filibuster is a critical tool in keeping the majority in check," said one defender. "It's not some 'procedural gimmick.' It's within the vision of the Founding Fathers of our country. They established a government so that no one person — and no single party — could have total control."
That was Reid speaking in 2005, when Senate Democrats were in the minority and the Republicans were proposing to weaken the filibuster.
Then, as now, the plan was for the party in power to invoke what's known as "the constitutional option" to change the rules of the Senate by simple majority vote, a power it arguably has.
Durbin said the Democrats want to mend the filibuster, not end it — to limit its use during little legislative steps along the way and to require filibustering senators to keep at least one representative on the chamber floor at all times in order to keep it going.
"They won't have to talk, but they will have to be there to hold the floor as long as we're in session," Durbin said. "It will make the filibuster more difficult and more visible to the American people. It will no longer be this casual thing, so it will have to be used responsibly."
Sounds reasonable. And given that Republicans seem to have a long-term grip on the House of Representatives, they need not worry that a weakened filibuster will allow the Democrats to enact Shariah law or something. These new rules might even come in handy next time the GOP takes control of the Senate. This will happen sooner or later, perhaps as early as 2014, when 20 of the 33 senators up for re-election will be Democrats.
Therein lies the potential problem.
The constitutional option is sometimes called "the nuclear option" for the way it threatens to destroy what's left of the bipartisan spirit of the Senate. And the fear is that once it's used by the majority to unilaterally impose somewhat small tweaks in the rules, the dam will be broken, and the next majority will feel empowered to make more radical changes.
Better would be for Senate leaders of both parties to get together and craft a set of filibuster reforms that they'll be able to live with no matter which side is in power — call it the golden rule option — and that will attract the 67 votes needed for a normal change in the rules.
Sixty-seven senators agreeing on something? You haven't heard that one in a while, have you?
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