Graham and Wicker Seek Regular Order to Break Floor Logjam

U.S. Senators Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) and Roger Wicker (R-Mississippi) on Wednesday urged a return to regular order when bringing legislation to the floor.  In a letter to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nevada), Wicker and Graham point to the resolution of previous logjams as a way to move forward.

 

In part, the letter states:

 

“In 2005, when an aggrieved majority proposed rules changes that would have resulted in limiting the rights of Senators to debate judicial nominations, a bipartisan group of members pulled the Senate back from choosing the so-called nuclear option.”

 

“We believe a similar outcome is within reach at this juncture.  In our view, the current conflict is less about specific Senate rules than it is about how those rules are used either to stifle debate or frustrate the will of a clear majority.”

 

Text of the letter follows.

 

August 1, 2012

 

The Honorable Harry Reid

Majority Leader

U.S. Senate

Washington DC, 20510

Dear Majority Leader Reid:

We are writing to express our concern regarding your recent remarks suggesting major changes to the rules of the Senate — changes that would severely compromise the rights of the minority.  We fear that such statements threaten far-reaching consequences for the institution of the Senate and its current and future membership.

Particularly troubling is your apparent reversal regarding when and how you might amend Senate rules requiring a two-thirds threshold to invoke cloture.  Last year, at the beginning of the 112^thCongress, you explicitly rejected what you now propose: making significant alterations to the rules by simple majority.  On January 27, 2011, you affirmed, “We’ve agreed that I won’t force a majority vote to fundamentally change the Senate — that is the so-called ‘constitutional option’ — and he (Leader McConnell) won’t in the future.”

Mr. Leader, the agreement and course set that day were correct.

 

 

The Senate tradition of unlimited debate derives from the institution’s constitutional origins as a body of careful deliberation, designed especially to be a protector of minority rights.  In explaining the broad utility of the filibuster in 2005, you asserted that the practice is “very much in keeping with the spirit of the government established by the framers of

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