HotShot Blog

The filibuster failed. It wasn't even close: 72-25. The United States Senate today confirmed an openly right-wing ideologue to the Supreme Court. There is almost no one on either side that doesn't believe Alito will push the entire judiciary strongly to the right, nullifying many of the labor rights, women's rights, civil liberties, and other rights we enjoy in this society. In fact, that was the express goal of conservatives in nominating him.

Yet there was only token Democratic opposition. Sure, the final confirmation vote was 68-42, an almost party-line vote. But on the vote that mattered, the vote to invoke cloture, 19 Democrats broke ranks, including solid "blue-state" Senators Leiberman, Akaka, Carper, and Inouye. This was the full list of Democrats who voted for cloture:

Akaka (D-HI)
Baucus (D-MT)
Bingaman (D-NM)
Byrd (D-WV)
Cantwell (D-WA)
Carper (D-DE)
Conrad (D-ND)
Dorgan (D-ND)
Inouye (D-HI)
Johnson (D-SD)
Kohl (D-WI)
Landrieu (D-LA)
Lieberman (D-CT)
Lincoln (D-AR)
Nelson (D-FL)
Nelson (D-NE)
Pryor (D-AR)
Rockefeller (D-WV)
Salazar (D-CO)

Spineless Democrats are certainly part of the problem, and I don't absolve them of their responsibility. But they are not the only cause of this monumental defeat. Conservatives have been organizing to take over the judiciary for the past 30 years. Pat Buchanan, during the Harriet Miers debacle, said that there were two big goals that spawned the conservative movement. The first was to defeat communism. The second was to move the courts in a decidedly conservative direction. That is why, he said, conservatives were furious with the Miers nomination. They felt this was their moment at last.

The New York Times ran an article yesterday about how long term conservative planning and hard work, since before I was born, led to this confirmation.

After the 1987 defeat of the Supreme Court nomination of Judge Robert H. Bork conservatives vowed to build a counterweight to the liberal forces that had mobilized to stop him.

With grants from major conservative donors like the John M. Olin Foundation, the Federalist Society functioned as a kind of shadow conservative bar association, planting chapters in law schools around the country that served as a pipeline to prestigious judicial clerkships.

During their narrow and politically costly victory in the 1991 confirmation of Justice Clarence Thomas, the Federalist Society lawyers forged new ties with the increasingly sophisticated network of grass-roots conservative Christian groups like Focus on the Family in Colorado Springs and the American Family Association in Tupelo, Miss. Many conservative Christian pastors and broadcasters had railed for decades against Supreme Court decisions that outlawed school prayer and endorsed abortion rights.

During the Clinton administration, Federalist Society members and allies had come to dominate the membership and staff of the Judiciary Committee, which turned back many of the administration's nominees.

Real change has never been brought about by politicians, but by broad political movements. Going all the way back to our revolution, a relatively small group of extremists led an historic rebellion against one of the most powerful colonial armies of the era. Since then, all the major changes that shaped American society, such as the abolition of slavery, Prohibition, the New Deal, and civil rights, have all been borne of large-scale movements that did not rely on a few politicians.

We need to stop looking at recent failures of our Democratic leaders as the problem in and of itself, but rather as a symptom of a larger disease. We face a conservative machine that comprises grassroots groups, churches, think tanks, and media outlets, all of whom communicate and collaborate regularly. This behemoth is paired against a random assortment of left-wing interest groups and policy institutes who don't seem to collaborate at all.

Which leads us to the Alito defeat. Focus on the Family and the RNC asked members months ago to pressure their senators, especially red-state Democrats, to confirm Alito. Other than some clamor from People for the American Way, there was little from the left-wing side. I looked back through my email and couldn't find even a single email from our very own Democracy for America on Alito. Incredible. Not one email on possibly the most important battle of Bush's term.

It may be that these groups were waiting for the hearings to expose Alito's extreme views to America. But by the time the hearings rolled around, Alito was a done deal. The whole process seemed an exercise in futility. The Republican majority were just about unanimously in support of Alito. A few Democrats would probably support him too. Hence, the only media coverage centered around Alito's wife running out in tears.

What would a real progressive movement have done? To start, we would have had a nationally coordinated campaign that started as soon as Alito was announced. Organizations such as DFA, MoveOn, DNC, People for the American Way, NARAL, the Sierra Club, and unions would form a working coalition. This coalition would be led by a national team which then thoroughly researches Alito and forms a strategy and message. The message would be spread throughout blogs, emails, letters to the editor, phone banks, etc. Every concerned group, no matter how big or small, would be provided with a set of facts and what exactly they could do to stop Alito.

Instead, we had no nationally coordinated effort. Various groups did things here and there. At DFNYC, we were somewhat twiddling our thumbs trying to figure out what we could do. It wasn't that the interest wasn't there. We simply did not know how a relatively small locally focused group could do anything to influence Washington, especially given that we already had two strong Democratic senators.

I am sure other progressives throughout the country felt similarly disempowered. We were not part of any national movement to move the Senate our way. Despite this, with some effort by Kerry and Kennedy we mounted a last ditch effort to filibuster. By this standard we were enormously successful. We got 25 Democrats to vote against cloture, many or most of whom had already been on the record as opposing a filibuster.

In order to win in the future, we will need coordinated national efforts to persuade the American public that they share our interests. If we can shape the hearts and minds on the ground, the politicians and votes will surely follow. Because even a spineless Democrat will vote progressive if the polls and media point in a progressive direction.