Senate Republicans are openly considering a radical change in that chamber's very nature in order to establish iron partisan control of the process for confirming federal judges. Appropriately, it's called the "nuclear option": a rules maneuver that would outlaw filibusters on any judicial nomination. Democrats should fight this power grab with every responsible means at their disposal, making it clear that it is simply the latest in a long series of efforts by congressional Republicans to abuse and entrench their power, stop real debate, and destroy the checks and balances the Founders built into our system of government.
Republicans claim they are defending a tradition of allowing all judicial nominations to come to the Senate floor, and pretend this is about 10 conservative nominees for lower federal court positions.
In reality, it's the president and his congressional allies who have violated tradition by refusing to withdraw highly controversial nominees (the Senate has duly confirmed more than 200 Bush judges), in sharp contrast to his predecessor, President Clinton. Having systematically ignored the Senate's constitutional responsibility to "advise" on these life-time appointments, the administration is now seeking to override the Senate's right of "consent."
And in reality, the threat of the "nuclear option" is not about lower court nominees. It's aimed at paving the way for a party-line vote to confirm questionable Supreme Court appointments in the near future, as part of the Republican Party's long-standing implicit pact with social conservatives to pack the Court with justices who will overturn the right to choose abortion established by Roe v. Wade.
Faced with this effort to trample minority rights in the Senate -- essentially remaking the Upper Chamber into a replica of the House, which Republicans now operate as a purely partisan enterprise -- Senate Democrats have no real choice but to withdraw their cooperation with the majority on the vast array of routine business requiring unanimous consent. And that's exactly what Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid of Nevada, supported by his entire caucus, is warning that Democrats will do.
Fortunately, Reid is acting in a highly responsible way in issuing that warning. He's made it clear that Democratic non-cooperation will not extend to measures involving support for our troops and other national security priorities, and will not interfere with essential government services, in sharp contrast to the petulant government shutdown launched by New Gingrich a decade ago. And he's also made it clear that Democrats will talk about the "nuclear option" in terms of the overall pattern of GOP abuse-of-power in Washington, and the need for systemic reform.
That's exactly the right approach. We have reached a juncture in Washington where one congressional chamber, the House of Representatives, has (under Republican management) become largely insulated from public opinion or accountability to voters, beholden to special interests, and contemptuous of the most basic principles of ethical responsibility and open debate. Now the Republican leadership seems determined to debase the Senate, designed as a forum for free debate and as a curb on partisan power, in the pursuit of an extremist agenda aimed at politicizing the courts and deviously undermining individual rights.
Democrats should support their senators in a principled effort to stop this partisan outrage, and to make real political reform the highest possible priority.
