The elimination of the filibuster for administrative and judicial nominees (not including those to the Supreme Court) will have short and long-term consequences. One of the easier things to predict is that the filibuster will be eliminated entirely in fairly short order. John Dickerson had a good insight on that likelihood:
As Majority Leader Harry Reid orchestrated the change in the rules governing executive nominations and lower-court appointments, his opponents cried tyranny, though they also promised that when they took power they would go further, applying the new standard to Supreme Court nominations. In other words, tyranny—but we promise we’ll give you more of it.
The filibuster on non-budgetary legislative items may live on a bit longer, but it won’t survive it’s first contact with anything that the majority’s political base is adamant about passing. So, despite the Democrats’ desire to limit the damage to the filibuster to those areas where the abuse was most egregious and inexcusable, the line they drew will not hold.
The next question to ask is how this change in procedure will affect the culture of the Senate. This one requires careful thought, and I’ve been ruminating on for almost a day know. For Dickerson and Jonathan Weisman, it will empower the moderates or centrists. Here’s Dickerson’s take:
Moderate senators will hold more power. Democratic Sens. Mark Pryor and Joe Manchin voted against the rule change. In the future, in a closely divided Senate, they are the kind of senators who will be the key vote to give or deny the majority their nominee.
Here’s Weisman’s:
If Harry Reid or future majority leaders extend the new rules to curb filibusters on legislation, a core group of moderates could emerge with new muscle. The Senate is usually narrowly divided, and it would not take a large coalition in the center to hold partisan legislation hostage.
Already, a group of former governors, led by Senator Joe Manchin III, Democrat of West Virginia, Senator Alexander and Senator Tom Carper, Democrat of Delaware, have begun banding together.
At this point, it would probably be helpful to do a thought experiment.
