The Congressional Record is a unique source of public documentation. It started in 1873, documenting nearly all the major and minor policies being discussed and debated.
“Filibuster (Executive Session)” mentioning John Thune was published in the Senate section on pages S137-S138 on Jan. 26.
Of the 100 senators in 117th Congress, 24 percent were women, and 76 percent were men, according to the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress.
Senators' salaries are historically higher than the median US income.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
Filibuster
Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, there has been a lot of talk about the legislative filibuster here in the Senate over the last few days. As we started the new Congress evenly divided between Republicans and Democrats, the Republican leader had proposed that the Democrat leader include a commitment to preserving the legislative filibuster and the power-sharing agreement the leaders have been working out. This should have been easy.
Less than 4 years ago, with a Republican President in the White House and Republicans in control of the Senate and the House of Representatives, a bipartisan group of 61 Senators affirmed their support for retaining the legislative filibuster, stating: ``We are united in our determination to preserve the ability of Members to engage in extended debate when bills are on the Senate floor.''
There are 26--26--current Democratic Senators--a majority of the current Democratic caucus--who signed that defense of the legislative filibuster when they were in the Senate minority. It is disappointing that the Democrat leader failed to express his support for this essential Senate rule.
Nevertheless, thanks to the recent commitment from two Senate Democrats to oppose any attempt to eliminate the filibuster--a commitment which secures this key protection for minority rights--
Leader McConnell is now moving forward without a statement from the Democrat leader.
But it is worth taking a moment to reiterate why the legislative filibuster is so important. The legislative filibuster, of course, is essentially the requirement that 60 Senators agree before the Senate can end debate and vote on a bill. In other words, you need 60 percent of the Senate to agree before you can pass a bill. This usually means that you need the support of at least some Members of the other party before you can move legislation.
The party in power doesn't always enjoy that rule. All of us would like the opportunity to pass exactly the legislation that we want. But most of us recognize that it is a good requirement.
The legislative filibuster ensures that the minority is represented in the legislation. This would be important even if elections tended to break 60 to 40 or 70 to 30 in favor of one party or another. All Americans, whether or not they are in the majority, deserve to be represented. But it is particularly important when you consider that our country is pretty evenly split down the middle.
While the advantage sometimes goes to Democrats and sometimes to Republicans, the truth is that our country is pretty evenly split, which means any attempt to disenfranchise the minority party means disenfranchising half of the country.
Of course, the party in power generally gets to accomplish more than the minority party--and that is appropriate. The country may be fairly evenly divided, but sometimes it wants to move more toward one side or the other.
What is not appropriate is to eliminate meaningful minority representation, which would be the consequence of eliminating the legislative filibuster. Our Founders recognized the importance of putting safeguards in place to ensure that majorities wouldn't curtail or eliminate minority rights.
That is why the Founders created the Senate. They made the Senate smaller and Senators' terms in office longer, with the intention of creating a more stable, more thoughtful, and more deliberative legislative body to check ill-considered or intemperate legislation or attempts to curtail minority rights.
And as time has gone on, the legislative filibuster is the Senate rule that has had perhaps the greatest impact in preserving the Founders' vision of the Senate. Thanks to the filibuster, it is often harder to get legislation through the Senate than the House. It requires more thought, more debate, and greater consensus--in other words, exactly--exactly--what the Founders were looking for.
I am grateful to my Democrat colleagues who have spoken up about their commitment to preserving the legislative filibuster. Republicans were committed to protecting the vital safeguard of minority rights when we were in the majority--despite, I might add, the then-
President's calls repeatedly to eliminate it--and I appreciate that a number of my Democrat colleagues share that commitment.
I am particularly grateful to the Senator from West Virginia and the Senator from Arizona for their uncompromising defense of minority rights and the institution of the Senate here in recent days.
Again, however, I am disappointed the Democrat leader chose not to express his support for this essential Senate rule. I would point out that when Democrats were in the minority in the Senate, they made frequent use of the legislative filibuster.
I hope that the commitment to the legislative filibuster expressed by President Biden and a number of Senate Democrats means the end of any talk of eliminating the filibuster. No matter how appealing it might be in the moment, destroying this longstanding protection for minority rights would be a grave error that both parties would live to regret.
I hope that all Senate Democrats will recommit themselves to preserving this fundamental feature of the Senate and to find compromise. We have work to do.
I yield the floor.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Padilla). Without objection, it is so ordered.
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