When President James Buchanan declared that the United States Senate is the “world’s greatest deliberative body,” he clearly had not envisioned Sen. Cory Booker (D., N.J.).
In yet another tirade on the floor, Sen. Booker attacked not just President Donald Trump but his Democratic colleagues for voting for a bipartisan bill on law enforcement.
Behind the “I am Spartacus” theatrics is a more troubling trend in the United States Senate as it devolves into a more populist, impulsive institution.
In 1872, Moncure Daniel Conway published an account of a meeting between Thomas Jefferson and George Washington. Jefferson questioned Washington’s support for the creation of a second or upper house in the form of the Senate. Washington asked:
“Why…did you just now pour that coffee into your saucer, before drinking?”
“To cool it,” answered Jefferson, “my throat is not made of brass.”
“Even so,” rejoined Washington, “we pour our legislation into the senatorial saucer to cool it.”
These days, it seems like legislation goes to the Senate to heat up.
The Senate is losing its constitutional and cultural moorings as the cooling saucer for our heated politics.
Instead, it is becoming more like . . . well . . . the house.
The role of the Senate is key to the Madisonian design in forcing compromise and deliberation. Senators were given longer, six-year terms to insulate them from the immediate political demands that often motivate the House.
That has changed with the 24-hour media-saturated political environment. It has changed in this age of rage.
Cue Corey Booker:
Putting the claims of “secret police” aside, and, once again, the imminent collapse of democracy, Booker was immediately set upon by his colleagues after he moved to block the bipartisan bill by fellow Democratic Sens. Catherine Cortez Masto (Nev.) and Amy Klobuchar (Minn.).
Klobuchar effectively accused Booker of grandstanding and hypocrisy:
“I will note that Sen. Booker objected to my police reauthorization bill, the cops funding, the Clinton cops funding, long before Donald Trump came into office. So this is not just about this. This is a long dispute over this type of funding.”
She also snapped back at Booker saying that he could not make a key hearing on the drafting of the bill because of a conflict, noting “I can’t help it if someone couldn’t change their schedule to be there.”
Cortez Masto struck back at the notion that Democrats should simply refuse to cooperate with the Administration or that working with Republicans is what Booker calls “complicity.”
Booker is clearly maneuvering for a possible presidential run and seeking to tap into the rage growing on the far left. He is also the inevitable result of the rising rhetoric of figures like Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer in pandering to the far left of his party. Democratic senators are now being denounced as “establishment” as Booker and others tack to the left to lead “the resistance.”
Booker just raised the anger ante for Democrats. They must either join the resistance and the rage or face the ire of their party. In the interim, the constitutional system will suffer. We need the House of Representatives as the “people’s house.” We do not need two Houses of Representatives. The Senate ideally moderates, not magnifies, the pressures and passions in the political system.
Booker’s tirades clearly resonates with some on the far left, but it is likely to come at a cost for the institution itself. As tensions build on the Democratic side, Teddy Roosevelt’s quip seems to be coming true in voting for bipartisan legisation: “When they call the roll in the Senate, the Senators do not know whether to answer ‘Present’ or ‘Not guilty.””