In Criticism of Sens. Manchinema (and Their 50 Republican Colleagues)

This blog article was supposed to be about hope—at least that was my plan for this post. But the hopes of so many USAmericans are at the point of being betrayed by two Democratic Senators and by all 50 Republican Senators, and one of the hopes for Pres. Biden that I wrote about on January 20 seems to have been completely dashed.

The Dashed Hopes for the Biden Presidency

One of the hopes for the Biden Presidency that I included in that Jan. 20 blog post was this: “Restoring political bipartisanship to the Capitol.” But rather than political bipartisanship being restored, if anything, it has even worsened during these nine months Biden has been in the White House.

Another hope I had for the current administration was concerted effort to combat the problem of global warming. That hope has perhaps not been completely dashed, but right now it looks as if there will be far less done in that regard than so many of us hoped for.

The dashed hope for bipartisanship seems almost entirely because of the intransigence of the Republicans, and especially the 50 Republican Senators under the leadership of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.

But the hope for significant action in combatting climate change has largely been dashed by Democratic Senators Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona.

Right now, the only bipartisanship that seems operative is that which is killing the Biden agenda, as captured in the following political cartoon by Bob Englehart way back on June 9. 

Criticism of Sens. Manchinema

In the U.S. Senate, 48 of the 50 Democratic Senators have been solidly in support of the President and his agenda. But with no Republican votes on most matters, it takes all 50 Democrats (plus Vice President Harris’s tie-breaking vote) to pass bills that can’t be filibustered.

Senators Manchin and Sinema have been so united in their opposition to especially the costly Build Back Better (BBB) legislation that their names have sometimes been conflated to Manchinema (check out #Manchinema).

Sens. Manchinemas’ main criticism of the BBB bill has been the price tag: they have been unwilling to approve little more than half of what the other 48 Democrats have been willing to support. And, sadly, at this point it seems that the major proposed cut is money to combat global warming.

I find it deplorable that just two Senators can wield so much power on such a critical issue. The long-term future of the country, and perhaps the world, is being jeopardized to a greater or lesser degree by just these two.

And the same two Senators have also been unwilling to consider support of a proposed change in the filibuster rule in order to pass the For the People Act, the voting rights bill which is so badly needed to protect American democracy.

Criticism of the 50 Republican Senators

Among Democrats, and especially those with progressive views, there is strong criticism of Sens. Manchinema—and for good reason. Perhaps it goes without saying, but the criticism of all the Republican Senators should be even stronger.

For example, the proposals in Biden’s Build Back Better proposal would benefit a multitude of USAmericans, not just Democrats. And the global warming counter-proposals are to ward off dire changes that would be detrimental for all, not just Democrats. But there is no Republican support.

And then what about voting rights? Back in 2006 when Bush was President, the Senate voted 98-0 to extend the landmark Voting Rights Act for another 25 years. In 2013, though, the SCOTUS wrongheadedly gutted that bill.

And then on Oct. 20, not even one Republican Senator would vote to even consider Manchin’s watered-down bill to protect voting rights. Manchin promised he would get ten Republicans to vote for the bill, which was less than the original Democratic proposal. But he failed to get even one Rep. vote.

So, yes, I am quite critical of Sens. Manchinema—but even more critical of the 50 Republican Senators, especially because of their unwillingness to help protect democracy in this country.

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** On Oct. 21, The Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson posted an insightful opinion piece that is closely related to the above article; you can read it here (with no paywall).

What about the Pledge of Allegiance—and Its Author?

Perhaps few of you know the name Francis Bellamy, but all of you USAmericans know well the Pledge of Allegiance, which he wrote in 1892. Bellamy died 90 years ago on August 28. 

Bellamy’s Beliefs

Francis Bellamy was born in May 1855, the son of a Baptist minister in New York. After graduating from the University of Rochester and further study at Rochester Theological Seminary, in 1879 Francis was ordained as a minister and became pastor of First Baptist Church of Little Falls, New York.

Before his 30^th birthday, Bellamy moved to Boston, becoming pastor of Dearborn Street Baptist Church. After serving five years there, in 1890 he accepted a call to Boston’s Bethany Baptist Church. But the next year, under pressure, he resigned from that pastorate and left the ministry.

There was tension in the church because of Pastor Bellamy’s political views. In 1889 the Society of Christian Socialists was founded in Boston, and Bellamy was elected to serve as the Society’s vice president. He also wrote for their newspaper, The Dawn.

In the May 1890 issue of that paper, Bellamy urged pastors to become Christian Socialists, defining Christian socialism as “the science of the Golden Rule applied to economic relations.”**

It must be noted that the last decades of the 19^th century was the time of the “robber barons,” a pejorative term typically applied to businessmen who used abusive practices to amass their wealth.” It was a time of bad working conditions for many, child labor, and other exploitative practices.

Provisions such as Social Security and laws restricting the employment and abuse of child workers were not enacted until the 1930s, after Bellamy’s death—but had he lived a few years longer, he no doubt would have been delighted with such “socialistic” advances.

Bellamy’s Pledge

After leaving the pastorate, Bellamy took a job with Youth’s Companion, a Boston-based family magazine with half a million subscribers.

As part of the promotion of the World’s Columbian Exposition to be held in October 1892 in commemoration of the 400^th anniversary of Columbus reaching the Americas—and to bolster the schoolhouse flag movement that Youth’s Companion fervently supported, Bellamy wrote this pledge:

I pledge Allegiance to my Flag and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation indivisible, with Liberty and Justice for all.

Over thirty years later, my flag was changed to the flag of the United States of America. That change was made largely to make it clear to immigrant children what flag they were saluting.

The words under God were not added until 1954, sixty-two years after the Pledge was written by an ordained minister without those words. As Baptist historian (and Thinking Friend) Bruce Gourley has explained, Bellamy’s text “intentionally reflected the Baptist heritage of church-state separation.”

Bellamy’s Pledge Now

As I have written previously, as a Christian I am not a fan of any Pledge of Allegiance to a flag or a nation. (You can read what I wrote about that in my 7/5/14 blog post, which has had nearly 1,200 “pageviews.”)

Apart from that, how can we USAmericans affirm that our country is “indivisible.” There seems to be greater polarity (political divisiveness) now than at any time since the Civil War, which ended 27 years before Bellamy wrote the Pledge.

Inexplicably, last week all 212 Republican members of the U.S. House of Representatives voted against the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act legislation.

So, not only is there great division among lawmakers, there also seems to be opposition to providing “Liberty and Justice for all.” Among other things, liberty and justice for all surely must make it possible for full voting rights for all citizens.

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** Content in the last two paragraphs was taken from Brian Kaylor, “The Baptist Socialist Who Left God Out of the Pledge” (Word&Way, Aug. 24, 2020). 

Tyranny of the Majority or Tyranny of the Minority?

Do you believe in majority rule? That is, should a 51% (or even 50.1%) affirmative vote decide who wins an election or what decisions pass a legislative body? That’s how we usually expect democracy to work. But 41 Senators can keep Senate bills from passing. Is that right?  

Protection from the Tyranny of the Majority?

As the “filibuster rule” now stands, 41 Senators can keep most Senate bills from coming to a vote. That is, it takes 60 Senators to vote cloture of a filibuster, and without that “super-majority” vote, the bill under question is not voted on.

The main argument in favor of the present system is that it protects the minority from the “tyranny” of the majority, which now, by the slimmest of margins, are Democrats.

Ross K. Baker, a distinguished professor of political science at Rutgers University, wrote an opinion piece published last week in USA Today. His point was that “it is not a good idea to get rid of the filibuster and thus enfeeble minorities and empower very slim majorities.”

Even when the bellicose language of “tyranny” is not used, the filibuster rule is seen by some, such as Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), as a way to encourage bipartisanship and cooperation in passing bills for the greater good of the country.

That may well have been largely true when Manchin (b. 1947) was a young man. But most probably it is, sadly, not effective now at this time of toxic polarity.

The views of the minority should, certainly, be listened to carefully and taken seriously. But should the minority have the power to determine what bills are voted on?

Protection from the Tyranny of the Minority?

As most of you readers know, I lived in Japan for 38 years and was a regular participant in university faculty meetings and in church business meetings.

Japanese culture places great emphasis on wa (group harmony). Thus, decisions were, ideally, made by consensus rather than by a vote—or by a vote after consensus had largely been reached.

Even in meetings of more than 100 faculty members, strong opposition from just a few vocal opponents of some motion on the floor could lead to postponing a decision or even withdrawing the motion.

One of my closest faculty colleagues complained more than once about such situations. That, perhaps, is when I first heard the term, “the tyranny of the minority.”

With the recalcitrance of the current 50 Republican U.S. Senators, it seems as though the U.S. Senate can often be aptly charged with being “guilty” of the tyranny of the minority.

What Can/Should Be Done?

The U.S. House this year passed, by the narrowest of margins but by a majority vote, the For the People Act (H.R. 1), which “addresses voter access, election integrity and security, campaign finance, and ethics for the three branches of government.”

Currently, unless the filibuster rule is changed, that bill is likely not to come to a Senate vote. The minority Party will kill the bill.

As it stands now, the same is true for the Equality Act (H.R. 5), the bill that “prohibits discrimination based on sex, sexual orientation, and gender identity . . . .”

Both of those bills not only procured the majority vote in the House, but public opinion polls also indicate that a majority of the adults in the U.S. agree with the provisions of those bills.

Those who advocate doing away with the filibuster have a strong case. But those who think the filibuster should be preserved, have arguments that must not be taken lightly. Something between all or nothing is called for.

In considering the matter of equality for all and protecting voting rights, though, surely the tyranny of the minority should not be seen as an acceptable course of action.

For the good of the country, the Senate must soon find a suitable position between the tyranny of the majority and the tyranny of the minority.

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In addition to Baker’s article linked to above, here are some of the opinion pieces I found to be instructive. (Some of these may be behind a paywall for non-subscribers.)

** Ruth Marcus, “Kill the filibuster — and reap what you sow” (The Washington Post, March 19)

** Zack Beauchamp, “The filibuster’s racist history, explained” (Vox, March 25)

** Jennifer Rubin, “Republicans’ big lie about the filibuster” (The Washington Post, March 25)

** John Fea, “The longest filibusters in U.S. history were launched to stop the Civil Rights Acts of 1957 and 1964” (Current, March 28)

Voting Rights vs. Voting Wrongs

Ten days ago, I posted an article about the disagreement between the U.S. Democrats who stress social equality and the Republicans who stress religious freedom. This post is about the Republicans’ emphasis on “voting integrity” and the Democrats’ emphasis on voting rights.  

The Ongoing Charge of Voting “Wrongs”

As you all know, the vast majority of Republicans, led by the former President, claim that President Biden was elected because of voter fraud. They insist that the election was “stolen” and the voting “wrongs” of 2020 must be corrected by new voting legislation.

In an Economist/YouGov poll taken two weeks after last November’s election, 88% of Trump voters said that Biden did not legitimately win the election. He won because of voter fraud, which I am calling voting wrongs.

Perhaps that percentage is lower now, four months after the election, but a poll taken of the CPAC attendees at the end of February indicated that 62% of them thought the most important issue facing the nation is “election integrity,” that is, elections free from fraud.

Accordingly, more than 250 bills have been introduced in state legislatures to revise voting laws. All of these are ostensibly for the purpose of eliminating voting wrongs such as were seen, it is claimed, in the 2020 election.

The March 13 issue of The Economist has a major article about the “election wars” in the U.S. It is titled, “Heads we win, tails you cheated,” expressing their view of the Republican position.

Incontrovertibly, a large segment of U.S. citizens is far more concerned with eliminating voting wrongs than protecting voting rights. This widespread concern must be taken seriously.

The Ongoing Demand for Voting Rights

In spite of the charges of voting wrongs by the Republicans and largely because of what is seen as a concerted effort to constrict/suppress voting rights, the Democrats in Congress are actively working for expanding those rights.

In the House, the For the People Act of 2021 (H.R. 1) was passed on March 3 by a vote of 220-210, with all the Republicans and one Democrat voting Nay.

To no one’s surprise, President Biden is in favor of the House-passed bill becoming the law of the land. He stated, “The right to vote is sacred and fundamental—it is the right from which all of our other rights as Americans spring. This landmark legislation is urgently needed to protect that right.”

On March 4, the inimitable Heather Cox Richardson summarized major provisions of H.R. 1:

The measure streamlines voter registration with automatic and same-day voter registration. It restores the protections of the 1965 Voting Rights Act gutted in 2013 by the Supreme Court’s Shelby County v. Holder decision. It allows early voting and mail-in voting. It curbs dark money in elections and ends partisan gerrymandering by requiring independent redistricting commissions to draw state districts. It gets rid of insecure paperless voting.

Nevertheless, on March 3 before the House vote, former Vice President Pence wrote in a piece titled “Election Integrity Is a National Imperative” that H.R. 1 “would increase opportunities for election fraud, trample the First Amendment, further erode confidence in our elections, and forever dilute the votes of legally qualified eligible voters.”

Citing Pence, among others, the editorial board of the Washington Post wrote on March 4, “Republicans’ rhetoric on H.R. 1 is apocalyptic. Are they that afraid of democracy?”

It certainly seems so. The next day, Dana Milbank, a noted Washington Post opinion journalist, posted “Republicans aren’t fighting Democrats. They’re fighting democracy.”

The Ongoing Need to Protect Democracy

Make no mistake about it: the Democrats who passed H.R. 1 are mainly seeking to protect democracy. They are NOT for any sort of election fraud, such as  

                 * people voting more than once in the same election   
                 * dead people voting  
                 * non-citizens voting for nationwide or statewide candidates 
                 * some ballots being destroyed or not counted 
                 * some ballots being counted more than once 
                 * voters being registered in illegal ways or more than once

They just want every citizen to have the right to vote. That is foundational for democracy.

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* Here is the link to the maiden speech of Senator Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.) on March 17. In that address, he speaks out strongly in support of H.R. 1, which is now S. 1, and ardently appeals for the protection of democracy by the passage of the voting rights bill. I hope you will take the time to listen to Sen. Warnock.