Unity, If You'll Take It
One of the more unfortunate elements of the failed effort to filibuster Samuel Alito is that it's sort of buried the basic high level of unity the Democrats showed in opposing his confirmation. It's extremely rare to see so few defections on a Supreme Court nomination -- even Clarence Thomas pulled in more Democratic support than Alito did. If you're willing to search hard enough you can always find evidence to support the perennial "Democrats in disarray" thesis, but I think by any fair standard the party has managed a heartening lack of disarray over the past 12 months and that Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid both deserve credit for helping to bring some real measure of discipline to the traditionally less-disciplined party in a traditionally not-so-disciplined political system.
Totally agree. Very important point, Matt!
January 31, 2006 9:08 AM | Reply | Permalink
Matt:
Couldn't have said it better myself, but did waste more space saying it a bit earlier today in my own blog.
January 31, 2006 9:19 AM | Reply | Permalink
A fun exercise in inspecting the change within the two parties is to look at the roll call for the Clarence Thomas vote.
It's quite possible that many of the Democrats you see voting "aye" here are Democrats who promised during their campaigns that they were pro-life. Certainly that's likely to apply to Exon, Boren, Shelby, and others.
It's also quite ironic that philanderer Bob Packwood decided that he couldn't stomach voting for Thomas.
January 31, 2006 9:45 AM | Reply | Permalink
Of the four Democrats who voted for Alito three came from heavily Red States. Why did Byrd vote for Alito?
January 31, 2006 10:40 AM | Reply | Permalink
What turnip truck do you think people fell off of... just one Dem shy of a filibuster... give me a break they knew he would be confirmed so they pretended to give a shit.
January 31, 2006 10:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
Thomas replaced Thurgood Marshall and Alito replaces O'Connor. I wouldn't advertise "more unity than in the completely shameful, unjustifiable debacle of voting for a Republican machine troll to replace the jurist that drove a wooden spear through the rotten tumor of segregation!" as silver lining. I think you might agree that was a monumental failure of judgment on the part of a nominally Dem. senate, and even more so retrospectively.
Also, I see very little negative effects of having tried the filibuster. In fact , the only negative effect is that it didn't succeed, and that the group of 14 found yet another variation on the popular theme of "caving in."
January 31, 2006 11:03 AM | Reply | Permalink
<span>42 voted against (enough to maintain a filibuster), but 17 wouldn’t vote for the filibuster.</span>
<span>To me, this says that the Right's message is correct: Dems are spineless wimps who don't stand for anything, and can't be trusted with having the balls to fight for what is right.</span>
Comparing it to a vote on a black nominee with the support of the African American community is really reaching.
January 31, 2006 11:13 AM | Reply | Permalink
Veganpa makes an important point. Whatever unity Reid and Pelosi have managed is going to be lost on the public with these back to back votes on the filibuster and the nomination itself. If 42 Democrats didn't believe Alito should take his seat, and that's enough to uphold a filibuster, it begs the question, why didn't they do it? Why didn't they keep the filibuster going? Are they not willing to do what it takes to stick up for what they believe? Sadly, that's the real message from these votes -- not unity.
Many Senators argued of course, that the political cost of a filibuster would be to high -- thus justifying their vote agains the filibuster while voting against the nomination.
This arguement doesn't hold water though, in light of the Democratic rhetoric about Alito, which painted his ascendency to the Supreme Court in near apocalyptic terms.
That level of rhetoric suggests the stakes are high enough to justify the political risks of a filibuster. But the Democrats didn't follow through. There's the real message American's take away.
At the end of the day, if the Democrats wanted effective unity (instead of the ineffective unity the produced), they would have decided more coherently between two options:
i.) the political risks of filibuster are too high, so we tone down the rhetoric, vote against a filibuster and against the nomination
or
ii.) the nomination really is that bad, the stakes are high enough to justify the political risks of a filibuster, we ramp up the rhetoric to make that point, vote for a filibuster, and against the nomination.
Either of those are unified and coherent stances, and therefore effective. What they actually did however, is a mish mash of the two, which once again for the Democrats is neither coherent or effective.
January 31, 2006 11:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
Once the nuclear option is invoked and upheld, that's it. If John Paul Stevens kicks the bucket, Bush can nominate Edith Jones or Janice Rogers Brown to replace him and there's nothing Democrats can do about it. As things stand now, there is still a chance that the nuclear option might fail in such a case--which makes it less likely to happen.
January 31, 2006 11:54 AM | Reply | Permalink
Instead, we have no leader (apologies to Reid & Pelosi, who do good jobs in their roles, neither of which is party leader).
January 31, 2006 12:30 PM | Reply | Permalink
it is amazing after watching the embarrassing outburst from Kennedy that the dems were able to be as unified as they were. I would not have followed there example in even the most menial of requests.
Both of the mainstream parties suffer from total lack of credibility and believability but it's most pronounced on these specialty committes. No independent thinking moderate senator is going to follow these leaders.
I find it hard to believe that the dems can't come up with more credible members to serve on these important and specialized committees than Kennedy (drunk "accidental homicide" and Biden (Plagarist). It just seems with all of the potential members they could come up with people better than this to possibly lead some of the other parties members to have voted against the nomination.
Until someone in this party gets a backbone and says we can do better than this they will continue to fail on matters that count to the average american.
January 31, 2006 12:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
The conventional wisdom is that Byrd is facing a very rich challenger, John Raese, for his Senate seat who announced his candidacy just days before the Alito votes were to be held. Raese apparently narrowly lost to Senator Rockefeller in 1984 general election and Governor Arch Moore in the 1988 GOP primary (this is all from Daily Kos). Seeing a financially secure candidate, or so the conventional wisdom goes, Byrd went ahead and voted for Alito in hopes of not angering his constituents. Of course it could just be that Byrd doesn't stand in the way of Supreme Court nominees..(but Byrd did vote against Clarence Thomas so that can't be true..)
January 31, 2006 12:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
What I failed to notice during the Alito "battle" was any evidence of a coordinated media strategy from the Democrats aimed at defeating the nomination. The opposition seemed halfhearted, disorganized and dead from the very beginning. And I simply don't understand why.
It seems to me that in a situation like this, you start by deciding as a caucus before the hearings, and before the floor debates, whether you are willing to accept the nominee or are determined to block his accession to the court. For all the talk about fillibusters and down votes, I didn't sense that a decision had been made to go all out.
Throughout this whole process, I have had the distinct impression that not a lot of Senate Democrats really cared much one way or another. Of course, most were going to vote against him in the end. But that just means that they cared about voting the right way to please their constituents back home. I never had the sense that there was a feeling of "we have to stop this guy from getting on the court!" There certainly was no campaign to do so.
The unity your talking about, Matt, is a mere unity in voting at the end. But it is not enough just to "stand up and be counted" and sign your name in the right place in the annals of defeat. The whole point is to succeed in accomplishing your agenda. And if someone argues that there was never any hope of defeating Alito, because the Democrats are the minority party, I simply disagree. It would have been an uphill battle to be sure, but there were huge, expolitable vulnerabilities in Alito's record. If the Democrats had it in them to Bork this guy, they had a fair chance of succeeding. But the hearings, fillibuster noise, etc were just tired stage accompaniments to a nomination that was a done deal from the start.
What were they up to? Were they afraid of someone? Italian-Americans? Some sort of business lobby? The whole time I had the feeling that something was staying the Democrats' hands, but I can't put my finger on it. The only thing I can think of is that maybe they want the Supreme Court to get even worse and scarier, so they can then use it as an issue in 2008. But that's frightening. And it's the same excuse we hear over and over again these days for the Democrats' holding back - it's all part of some elaborate grand strategy for creating a promissory note that will be cashed in 2008. But you can't just electioneer all the time. From time to time you need to get something done with the hand you've been dealt.
January 31, 2006 1:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
The nuclear option intimidation machine has worked to perfection. The Republicans threaten. The Democrats surrender. The media reports the surrender. So much for a party with the strength of character to fight the tough fights. Surrender is not a winning strategy.
January 31, 2006 3:44 PM | Reply | Permalink
You have nailed it, on this issue and so many others.
January 31, 2006 3:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
After the shambles that was the committee hearing I think many Democrats decided to cut their losses and move on. The last poster, "Brevard", makes a good point. If the members on the committee came across in a more professional manner then the remainder of the party may have been willing to sign up for a fight. As it is, Kennedy makes people cringe and Biden comes across as creepy. The Democrats on the committee, Feinstein excepted, showed their lack of professionalism and disregard for the whole process when they walked out during the testimony of other federal judges. The American people were unimpressed with the performance of the Democrats on the committee which gives Democratic senators in "Red States" no room to maneuver.
January 31, 2006 9:14 PM | Reply | Permalink