Filibuster Facts
You probably thought you had heard enough about the filibuster rules in the U.S. Senate when you were in high school government class, but it’s a topic of conversation again in Washington.
Many Democrats say it’s time to get rid of it, because it means the party in the minority can block the majority from doing whatever it wants. That’s actually true and exactly what the founders had in mind by having the House be set up differently from the Senate. We are a republic after all, not a straight democracy.
Those same folks who want to get rid of it say Republicans have historically abused the filibuster. Granted, these days “historically” has come to mean anything within the past month, but a fact-based look at history suggests the Democrats love the filibuster when they are in the minority.
For example, let’s look at the two record filibusters…one for the longest single-member speaking at one time, and one for the longest party-controlled filibuster.
The record for the so-called “standing filibuster” was set by South Carolina’s Strom Thurmond. At the end of his political life, he was a Republican…but at this point, he was a Democrat who had recently run for president as a Dixiecrat, complete with a platform to return the South to pre-Civil War days. He spoke for just over a day…24 hours and 18 minutes…against the 1957 Civil Rights Act. It still stands as the longest single-person filibuster in Senate history.
The longest multi-senator filibuster was led by southern Democrats in 1964…to prevent passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. That filibuster lasted 60 days, during which no other Senate business could transpire.
Given that history…perhaps we understand why Democrats want to get rid of the filibuster. They’re now in charge, and they don’t want us to remember their past.News/Talk 1540 KXEL · Iowa Politics — Fri. Mar. 19, 2021
