UNPRINCIPLED AVOIDANCE OF TOUGH QUESTIONS, IT'S WHAT MODERATES SPECIALIZE IN:

Senate Does the Sidestep: Why stand on principle when a quick shuffle on filibusters will do? (Ronald A. Cass, May 25, 2005, LA Times)

Every time a line is drawn on principle, a deep-seated human instinct emerges — the instinct to compromise. [...]

In the fighting leading up to the Great Compromise, Republican leaders were insisting on a return to the traditional competence-plus-propriety standard for confirmation of judicial nominees, and historic respect for presidential authority.

In the 1990s, even Democratic Sens. Edward M. Kennedy, Patrick Leahy and Joseph Lieberman said an up-or-down vote on the president's picks was constitutionally required. That's the principle Majority Leader Bill Frist, a Republican, was pushing this time around.

Democratic leaders were standing on principle too: the minority's right to resist majority rule. But Democrats had taken minority rights to a new level by filibustering judicial nominations. They targeted a group of 10 nominees who offended interest groups that support Democrats. [...]

Filibustering legislation changes the balance of power within Congress. But filibustering judicial nominations changes the constitutional allocation of power between president and Senate. And, ultimately, it threatens the independence of the courts.

Earlier this week, both sides thought they were on track for a resolution of this dispute. Would the Senate rule that filibustering judges was out of bounds? Yes or no? We were about to see which principle the "world's greatest deliberative body" would adopt. We didn't get there.

Instead, amid the self-congratulations of the Great Compromisers, what we got was a more serious threat to constitutional principle. The bipartisan group of 14 Republicans and Democrats — a "super-minority" — stuck to no principle at all except that of avoiding having to choose one.

In the interest of reducing the atmosphere of partisanship in the Senate they delayed resolution of the issue until a point when tensions will be much higher and the stakes greater.

Posted by Orrin Judd at May 25, 2005 6:55 AM