Harry Reid unilaterally eliminated the filibuster, but only for presidential appointments (including all judicial appointments except Supreme Court). Let’s examine why he eliminated what he did.
Allowing a filibuster of presidential appointments only benefits the party opposing the current president, in other words, Republicans. The Democrats keep voting lockstep to affirm every soap opera producer and hard core leftist that Obama appoints.
Reid did not eliminate the filibuster of Supreme Court appointments simply because there were no vacancies on the Court. If a vacancy had come open and Republicans had started making any noise about a filibuster then Reid would have unilaterally eliminated the filibuster for Supreme Court appointments as well. Remember, Reid did not eliminate the filibuster as part of the regular adoption of rules at the beginning of the session. He did it unilaterally in the middle of the session simply because he decided that he wanted to.
So the first thing the Republicans should do is reinstate the filibuster of all presidential appointments. At the very least, reinstate the filibuster for all judicial appointments. The soap opera producers and hard core leftists that Obama names for cabinet and ambassador posts will be gone in a couple of years. Obama’s judicial appointments will be legislating from the bench for a generation to come.
Reid did not eliminate the filibuster for legislation because it would not have benefited him at all to do so. After the Democrats lost their veto proof majority in the Senate, the Democrats started making noises about “filibuster reform” of the legislative filibuster. That stopped once the Republicans took control of the House. From then on, it was pointless for Reid to do anything about legislative filibusters, since the House Republicans effectively had veto power over any legislation that Reid could push through the Senate. Reid did not allow any legislation that he did not want passed to even have a vote on the floor of the Senate.
So the next thing the Republicans should do is eliminate the legislative filibuster under the name of “filibuster reform.” At the very least, make the Democrats do a good old fashioned Mr. Smith Goes to Washington talk-until-you-drop filibuster any time that they want to try and stop legislation from passing the Republican controlled Congress.
In 2016, if a Republican is elected President and the Republicans hold onto the Senate, then they can change the rules again to eliminate Democrat filibusters of all Republican presidential appointments. If the Democrats take back the Senate, then I absolutely guarantee that they will change the rules to however it suits them.
Exactly - that is the Reid precedent.The Reid precedent is not limited to the specifics of what Reid did - it is the fact that Reid did whatever helped Harry Reid. Therefore, as I said, there being no benefit to the Republicans to disallow the filibuster of Obama nominees, the Republicans should allow it.
But they might as well be upfront about the fact that, in 2016 if they have control and a Republican takes the WH, they will follow the Reid precedent and do precisely what is convenient to the Republicans. That, and not some wimpy “see, we’re really nice guys” pose, would set the preconditions for passage of a constitutional amendment to regularize the rules for all cases going forward. The Republicans, in charge of both houses of Congress in 2015, should take the lead in formulating the language of such an amendment.
The POTUS has no authority in the question of proposed amendments; either 2/3 of both houses go along, or they don’t. If 2/3 of both houses agree, majority approval by the legislatures of 3/4 of the states presumably would follow in due course.