Tuesday, May 24, 2005 | 11:05 a.m.
WASHINGTON -- The Senate voted today to end years of delaying tactics that blocked the nomination of Priscilla Owen to a federal judgeship, the first fruit of a bipartisan agreement to break the logjam over President Bush's judicial choices.
The vote was 81-18 with opponents of the Texas Supreme Court justice falling well short of the 60 needed to continue their filibuster. A vote to confirm Owen could come as early as today.
Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada led the Democrats voting for the cloture motion that halted debate on Owen's nomination. Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., voted for her.
Owen, nominated to a seat on the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, has been blocked four times by Democratic filibusters in the four years since Bush first nominated her early in his first term.
But this time she benefited from an agreement reached by seven Republican and seven Democratic senators, reached Monday, that opened the way for yes-or-no votes on some of Bush's stalled nominations while protecting the future right of Democrats to use the filibuster to block nominees they feel are out of the mainstream.
An eclectic group of 14 senators was able to do what Reid and Majority Leader Bill Frist of Tennesse could not -- strike a compromise that averted the "nuclear option."
An agreement was reached Monday night just hours before senators were expected to clash over the controversial maneuver this morning. Opponents of changing the Senate's rules to effectively eliminate filibustering on judicial nominees said such a move would send the Senate to new lows in partisan rancor and would effectively make the Senate a rubber stamp for the president's nominations.
The deal was struck in the final meeting of the bipartisan negotiating team -- seven Democrats and seven Republicans -- that has been working behind the scenes in close consultation, but without direct participation of Reid and Frist.
"The biggest factor was that we were running out of time," said Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Neb., a lead negotiator.
At issue was a showdown that had been scheduled for today on the Senate floor in which Republican senators likely would have changed a long-standing Senate rule that requires 60 votes to halt a filibuster. The filibuster traditionally has been a valuable tool for the minority party, in part because it can indefinitely delay votes, forcing the majority to work out compromises.
The two parties were prepared to come to blows today because Democrats had blocked 10 Bush judicial nominees with the filibuster, so Republicans were seeking to scrap it by changing the Senate rule so that only 51 votes would be required to halt a filibuster.
Under the agreement reached late Monday, the seven Republicans agreed to oppose scrapping the filibuster. The seven Democrats agreed to allow votes on three of five controversial federal appellate court nominees -- Owen, Janice Rogers Brown and William Pryor. Democrats had previously conceded to allow votes on two other controversial nominees re-nominated by Bush this year.
But, according to the agreement, there is "no commitment to vote for or against" two other conservatives named to the appeals court, Henry Saad and William Myers.
The agreement said future nominees to the appeals court and Supreme Court should "only be filibustered under extraordinary circumstances," with each Democratic senator holding the discretion to decide when those conditions had been met.
That ambiguous language could cause future problems, observers noted.
"It's subjective," Sen. John Warner, R-Va., one of the negotiators, acknowledged.
Whatever the long-term implications of the agreement, after a wait of more than four years, Owen seemed headed for confirmation at long last, by Wednesday at the latest.
"It's about time," Bush exclaimed. "I'm pleased that the Senate is moving forward on my judicial nominees who were previously being blocked. These nominees have waited years for an up-or-down on the Senate floor, and now they'll get one."
For their part, Reid and his House counterpart, Rep. Nancy Pelosi scheduled a "unity event" to argue that the agreement was a victory - and a message to the White House that the president must consult with Congress on future court nominees.
The agreement caught many on Capitol Hill off guard. Even Reid on Monday afternoon had told reporters, "I'm sorry to say, there is no compromise."
Reid starred in a 90-second television commercial that ran nationally on Fox News and a few Washington-area network affiliates about 8 p.m. Eastern time, just minutes after senators had broken the news that an agreement had been reached. In the commercial, paid for by The Alliance for Justice, Reid reached out to "Republican senators of courage and conviction" urging them to vote with Democrats to preserve filibuster rules.
"I'm grateful to my colleagues who brokered this deal," Reid said moments later in brief remarks on the Senate floor. "This will be the first night in at least six weeks that I will sleep peacefully."
On the Senate floor, Reid ripped up a crumpled political scorecard he had been carrying in his pocket -- the list of names of senators that he and other Democrats had been lobbying. "The nuclear option is off the table," a smiling and visibly relieved Reid said.
Reid joined a number of senators saying the final-hour agreement was a "victory for the American people." He and Frist were gracious in their public praise for each other.
"I have admiration for the good doctor from Tennessee," Reid said of Frist. "I hope that we, working together, can do great things for this country. The country needs a Senate that works together."
But Reid also seemed to claim some victory for his party for having preserved the filibuster for the Democrats. Throughout the standoff in recent weeks, Reid had said Democrats would not allow the filibuster rule to be changed, and Frist had said he would accept only up-or-down votes on all nominees.
"Checks and balances have been protected," Reid told reporters at a news conference, prior to his more collegial Senate floor remarks. "The integrity of the Supreme Court has been protected against the vocal and radical right wing."
Reid said a Republican power grab had been turned back.
"We have sent President Bush and Vice President Cheney an undeniable message: The abuse of power will not be tolerated. It will not be tolerated by Democrats or Republicans," he said.
Reid said Bush and Cheney had tried to "trample the Constitution and grab absolute power."
Reid added that Bush should consult with Senate Democratic leaders on the Judiciary Committee when it came to Supreme Court nominees. He also added, "If the president has an agenda, we're willing to work on his agenda, but he should have a little more humility."
Frist did not promise to never use the nuclear option, which Republicans call the "constitutional option," although he didn't explain how he could invoke the measure with seven Republicans pledged against it.
Frist said it was important that the seven Democratic signers of the agreement give up using the filibuster as it was used in the last Congress.
"Ten different nominees were blocked by 18 filibusters in the last two years ... with six more filibusters threatened," Frist said. "That was wrong."
The arrangement makes it much less likely, "nearly impossible," for future filibusters, Frist said.
"Given this disarmament ... there is no need to use the constitutional option," he said.
Frist, who is a potential 2008 presidential candidate sensitive to a conservative base of voters, said he had not been a party to the agreement.
Both Reid and Frist now likely will face angered special interest groups that had heavily lobbied them not to give in to a compromise. Frist signaled that he wasn't entirely thrilled with the agreement. All nominees still deserve the "courtesy and respect" of an up-or-down vote, Frist said.
"It has some good news and it has some disappointing news," Frist said.
Ensign said he did not approve of the agreement because it sets a precedent.
"We have allowed 40 senators to determine for all of us who will be considered by the Senate," Ensign said in a statement. "I have expressed grave concern that good people will not want to put their names forward for consideration if they have to endure a grueling nomination process and still not be assured a vote by the Senate.
"That concern still exists for our best and brightest nominees with the creation of this deal, and it is a concern that should be shared by every American who cares about a strong and independent judiciary."
One negotiator, Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, said Reid was not necessarily a clear winner in the high-stakes game of political brinksmanship just because the nuclear option was off the table for now.
"It bodes well for both leaders and this institution to state that we're not going to upend 200 years of history" by changing Senate rules, Snowe said.
A primary motivator for the negotiating group was the fact that nobody in the Senate could predict what such a drastic measure would mean for the future of the Senate, Snowe said.
The group's compromise avoided a "crisis," said Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, another negotiator. "Never have I seen 12 senators work so hard toward a common goal. We just refused to fail."
Not everyone believes this is the last of the nuclear option.
Several senators signaled that lasting damage was done in the long, bruising fight over judges and the filibuster.
"If we don't all make efforts, we could be right back at this point," Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., warned. "The poison of partisanship is still here."
Sen. Wayne Allard, R-Wyo., said the agreement was a "good step" toward bipartisanship. But he said he still has an "overriding concern" about filibusters being used to block judges.
"I hope we can look at each judge that is before us and vote up or down based on their qualifications," Allard said.
Moments earlier, Reid had said he was disappointed there were still "threats" of using the nuclear option, despite the agreement.
"It's gone," Reid said of the nuclear option. "Let's forget about it."
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