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Late last night, word came that a group of moderate senators from both parties had agreed to a plan that would prevent the Republican leadership from eliminating the filibuster from debate over judicial nominations. The parliamentary institution, enshrined in the constitutional rights of the minority to participate in and curb the activities of the majority party, can be an annoyance to leaders, but has served both parties consistently throughout Senate history and is seen as a key check on unfettered centralized power in Washington.

The Democrats have successfully used the filibuster to prevent the confirmation of several Bush judicial nominees, seen as radical both ideologically and judicially. Last week, they accused Priscilla Owen of wanting "to take us back to the 19th century" with a view to changing child-labor laws. Republicans and conservative groups, who are anxious to fill vacancies with judges they favor, have been seeking means to undermine the filibuster, but many moderate senators have been advocating all along that to undermine the filibuster is to undermine the constitution and the entire system of US legislative government.

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist had planned to call for a vote on whether judicial nominations should be subject to the filibuster, with the possibility that a tied vote would be broken by the Vice President's vote as President of the Senate, a constitutional role. This would be an unfavorable situation for a number of reasons and from a number of different points of view, and many have spoken about the slippery slope toward stripping minority views of the right to be heard at all in legislative debate, of a slipping toward rule by the whim of those who hold power.

The compromise reached between 7 Democrats and 7 Republicans states that the filibuster should be applied in future to judicial nominees only "under extraordinary circumstances". Nevertheless, each senator (presumably from the minority party, and currently most likely a Democrat) reserves the right to decide what conditions fit the description of "extraordinary circumstances". The agreement also will allow the confirmation of three key judicial appointments to come to a vote in the Senate.

Minority Leader Harry Reid spoke favorably of the agreement and looked forward to working with the President, but specified that Bush "should have a little more humility" in his dealings with Congress and with the minority. Sen. Frist was not so upbeat: he stressed that he had not been a party to the agreement and that he would watch carefully to ensure that Democrats did not take advantage of the agreement's wording. He also emphasized that the option to call for a vote to eliminate the filibuster is still available and appeared to indicate that he will continue to apply pressure to get the remaining Bush nominees to a vote.

While only 14 senators signed this compromise pact, they are thought to have enough influence to prevent either party from breaking the pact. Thomas Ferraro, of Reuters, writes "The deal had a pointed message for Bush: Consult with members of both parties before offering any more judicial candidates to the Senate for confirmation."

The Congressional Black Caucus, in order to defend the concept of minority rights within the functioning of the US Congress, held a press conference explaining the importance of the filibuster in Senate procedure. They cited the many occasions where the Republican party and conservative southern Democrats used the filibuster to oppose civil rights legislation in the mid-twentieth century, saying that though they opposed the politics of such an implementation of the filibuster, it served to protect the right of minority viewpoints to be heard in open debate, and even to control the direction of debate. [Full Story]