No Downside To the Filibuster At All?

Year-End  2025

   As of this writing, we are into the longest government “shutdown” in history. The good news is the shutdown is exposing the evils of government-funded welfare and how many people could work but refuse to. Welfare, intended to be temporary and for those physically and mentally disabled, has been abused by the able-bodied for decades in levels we can scarcely afford. I long knew there are dependent Americans who actually feel entitled to other people’s money, but the levels of entitlement shocked even me. One SNAP recipient actually said online, “It is the responsibility of taxpayers to feed my kids.” People online have said if they do not get their food stamps, they will just steal food from the stores…or people. I don’t doubt they will. This is the expected outcome of government-funded charity and the destruction of the work ethic and self-reliance it causes. This shutdown will hopefully force massive entitlement reform, more so than we saw in the 1990s. 

   This shutdown also reveals that our federal government is involved in way more than it should be, judging by how many things we are being told are not being funded now. 

   Senators say the filibuster is necessary, that it forces the two parties to work together in the Senate to get sixty votes. Of course, if both Democrats and Republicans had been obeying the written (enumerated) US Constitution all these decades, it would not matter which party was in the majority because they could only vote on certain things allowed by the Article 1: Section 8.     

   Recently, House Speaker Mike Johnson was asked about President Trump’s call to use the “nuclear option” to get rid of the filibuster. Johnson said that the GOP has traditionally seen the filibuster as a safeguard. GOP Senators said it “holds us back from the Democrat’s worst impulses.” Johnson asked, “What would Democrats do if they had no filibuster impediment, no speed bump at all? They’ve already told us. They would pack the Supreme Court, go from nine to thirteen or fifteen or seventeen or however many liberals they could pack on the Court. You would have D.C. or Puerto Rico be made into states, which would give four extra senators there in the count, and make us (Republicans) a permanent minority.” Johnson added, “You would see massive restrictions of the 2nd Amendment, second amendment rights, you would see them (Democrats) federalize elections, so they could take over and manipulate things in the red states. There are a lot of abuses that could come.” 

   So, the Democrats in power could do all that, Johnson? You are saying Republicans, the Supreme Court and the Constitution would be powerless to stop them? Really? If the only restrain of one-party oligarchy is the filibuster, then our constitutional republic is already dead.

   Republicans are assuming that if they keep the filibuster while they are in power, Democrats in the majority will too. That is wishful thinking. The restrain We the People will have on any Democrat Senate majority – besides holding both parties to voting on only what the Constitution allows going forward and voting into office Constitutional alternatives – is that Democrats in power always, always go too far, promoting radical, communistic legislation for things most Americans will never support (transgenders in women’s locker rooms and sports, voting rights for illegal immigrants, federal investigations into and arrests of angry parents at school board meetings and other political opponents, universal basic income, etc.) and within a few years, Americans vote them right back out of power.

   The Constitution allows for both House and Senate to choose their own rules. I am not debating that.

   As I have asked before: 

   1) What good does it do to give the Republicans the numerical majority in the Senate if they are going to keep the filibuster?

   2) Why did Senators revoke the filibuster for Supreme Court nominees, reverting to a simple majority vote in the Senate to confirm them, if needing sixty voters is such a good thing? Could it be that both parties knew that if they kept a sixty-vote majority, they would never get their nominees approved for the high court (i.e. – could not get things done)? So, apparently, the filibuster is “badly needed” to check the majority party, except when it comes to Supreme Court nominees?

   Also, with the filibuster, elected Republican senators in power not getting reforms passed can now can say to angry voters, “Well, we couldn’t get enough Democrats to help us pass this legislation in the Senate. We couldn’t get sixty votes. What do you expect us to do?” 

   How convenient.

   Think back, friends. Did you hear any GOP senate candidate in past Senate races in your states saying to voters at campaign stops, “And remember this November, my friends, it’s not enough to get us Republicans a simple majority. You must turn out at the polls to get our party a filibuster-proof majority?”

   No, Republicans will never say that while campaigning because they will come across as ungrateful and demanding.

   Instead, you heard GOP candidates say, “Help us take the Senate back from the Democrats (meaning a simple majority vote).”

   Speaker Johnson said, “They (Democrats) keep saying Republicans are in charge of the government. We aren’t. Not in the Senate. Sixty votes control the senate, not a bare majority.” Johnson and other Republicans place the burden of getting a filibuster proof majority on conservative and independent voters who already gave the GOP majority control of the House, Senate, and White House simultaneously over the years.

   I’ve heard Democrats out of power say that we cannot allow the tyranny of the majority to oppress the minority. They have no problem with using the filibuster and their few votes as the minority to prevent the majority – and the will of the electorate – from getting things done. Democrats in power also decry any Republican Senate minority when they use the filibuster, saying, “The voters spoke very clearly last November. We won. Our government and the will of the electorate is being thwarted by a vocal minority of alt-right extremist Senators. Democracy is on the line because of Republican selfishness and authoritarianism.” 

   Filibuster defenders make it sound as though there are only upsides to the filibuster, never any downsides. They fail to mention the filibuster also gives the minority party veto power over their majority, such as the recent prevention of a continuing resolution from being passed in the Senate. So, Republicans, are you saying to the voters who helped you retake the Senate that needing sixty voters, not just a 50+1 majority, to get things done is not a downside to the filibuster?

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