SUPPLEMENTAL REMARKS BY DAVID R. OBEY, JOINED BY AL SWIFT AND SAM GEJDENSON

This Committee is the latest in a long line of committees that have been charged with the responsibility of trying to make the Congress a more effective and a more accountable institution.

This is the fourth time that I have had the privilege to serve on such a committee during my service in the Congress. This is the second time that I have served on such a committee with Chairman Hamilton, who has a long and distinguished record of being in the forefront of efforts to make all government institutions more responsive and more effective. Many of the recommendations proposed by this Committee will further that tradition.

I would like to address a few remarks to a recommendation which is not in this report because the Committee's original charter precluded us from dealing with it at the committee level. That issue is the Senate filibuster -- and to a lesser extent the issue of anonymous Senate holds by which a single Senator can block movement on a piece of legislation until he can get his way on an unrelated item.

Because the Committee was established in a manner which precluded House Members from voting on Senate matters and vice-versa, House Members could not legislatively press solutions to that vexing problem. But I believe that as we move through the process, we must address this problem because the Senate filibuster is not just a Senate issue; it is an issue which affects the reputation and effectiveness of the House of Representatives. It is an issue which goes to the very heart of the principle of legislative accountability. Until it is changed, I deeply believe that the House of Representatives and the Congress as a whole will be profoundly handicapped in acting upon the people's agenda.

When the country elected a Democratic President, a Democratic House, and a Democratic Senate, they had a right to expect that the majority party would be able to fashion an agenda on behalf of the American public and produce on that agenda. But so long as the filibuster remains (and its little brother, the anonymous Senate hold), we will continue to be blocked from moving on that agenda.

In past days, the Senate filibuster was used only on questions of great national and historical import such as civil rights and constitutional amendments. Today, the filibuster is routinely used by willful minorities to prevent the majority from even obtaining a vote on a whole range of issues, extending to the most routine and most mundane. This session, for instance, the President was denied a vote in the Senate on his jobs package. The filibuster, or the threat of one, was used often on issues as parochial and pork-related as grazing fees. The filibuster has been used in recent years to block action on the crime bill, on unemployment compensation, and a host of other economic issues.

In fashioning their own legislative products, House Members now routinely must consider how that legislation must be shaped to overcome a potential Senate filibuster. As a result, even when the House completes action on a broad array of measures, in the end, that action is often blocked not by a minority who had forged a majority of votes to stop us, but by a willful minority who do not have the votes but who nevertheless have enough support to prevent our legislative product from even coming to a vote.

I do not believe that it is necessary to eliminate the Senate's right to engage in extended debate; that is a hallowed Senate tradition, and I respect it. Eventually, there ought to be a process under which a majority over time can reach a solution by obtaining a vote on its major legislative program. I certainly make an exception in the case of constitutional amendments because I recognize that constitutional principles are so important that any and all tools ought to be made available to those who are attempting to preserve the integrity of that document. But continued routine use of the filibuster discredits us all. It discredits the entire legislative body. It is beyond public comprehension that a majority cannot eventually obtain at least a vote so that the public knows who stands where on major issues of government.

There has been a tendency in the Congress over the past 10 years, not only to block the majority from obtaining votes on matters of high concern, but also to negate in effect the results of elections by moving toward the idea of more and more super-majorities throughout the legislative process.

With the exception of constitutional amendments, I deeply believe that super-majorities and any other devices that prevent the ability of the majority to do its job, or at least to get a vote on its product, are anti-democratic. These devices help create gridlock which in turn increases public dismay about the effectiveness of Congress as an institution.

As the Committee recommendations work their way through the process, I will be pursuing any and all options to make certain that we deal with the major imperative of reform which is to end the practices which lead to gridlock and which lead to a denial of accountability.

The highest purpose of rules changes in the House and Senate is not to simply make things more convenient or more pleasant for this or that group within the Chamber; the purpose is to enhance accountability and to allow the institution to get its work done. The Senate filibuster and the practice of anonymous holds stand in the way of accountability and effectiveness and must be changed.

David R. Obey.
Al Swift.
Sam Gejdenson.