Fillibuster used to uphold slavery. Good read.

[siceone]

The head of one of the nation's oldest civil rights organizations is blasting Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid as a "Slave-ocrat" for fighting to preserve the Senate's right to filibuster against President Bush's judicial nominees, saying the maneuver has a long history of being used to oppress African Americans.

Hours after the announcement of a Senate deal to save judicial filibusters, Congress of Racial Equality chief Roy Innis told WWRL Radio's Steve Malzberg and Karen Hunter: "The filibuster is bad and it's wrong and it's evil . . .

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"People don't realize how bad the filibuster has been in terms of the rights of black people in this country. We were delayed from getting our rights for over a century because of the filibuster."

The CORE chief then proceeded to give the New York radio audience a history lesson in the way the parliamentary maneuver has been exploited.

"The filibuster started in 1841 with John Calhoun in the secessionist state of South Carolina," noted Innis. "And John Calhoun was a Slave-ocrat, a Democrat-Slave-ocrat. Calhoun was vice president of the United States under Andrew Jackson - another Slave-ocrat. Democrat, Slave-ocrat - the same thing."

Innis noted that the Republican Party was started in 1856 "specifically for one purpose - to end slavery."

The civil rights leader, who every year hosts the nation's largest Martin Luther King Day dinner, said that today's Democrats "are up to their old tricks" - upholding their "Slave-ocrat" tradition by filibustering African American judicial nominees like Janice Rogers Brown.

Stunned by Innis's arguments, co-host Hunter - an African-American herself - asked the CORE chief: "What has happened to you?"

Innis shot back: "I know what has happened to black people . . . I'm not going to sell out black people by going with Bobby Byrd, the Ku Klux Klan member in the U.S. Senate."

"The NAACP and the Congressional Black Caucus today, this morning, are in the bosom of Robert Byrd," Innis charged, before demanding:

"Tell me, why did the Congressional Black Caucus join the Slave-ocrat, Harry Reid from Nevada, in trying to deny the rights of this black woman, Janice Rogers Brown?"

Innis also chastised the Senate's lone black member, Barack Obama, for campaigning for Sen. Byrd.

"Isn't that something," he told Malzberg. "He's is the bosom of Bobby Byrd, the former Ku Klux Klan member."

Innis went on to say that Obama is a "good man - but he's young and he doesn't know the history of our people. He doesn't know the history of Bobby Byrd and the Democrats."

[bigpoppanils]

his arguments are absurd.

the democrats of today are MUCH different than the democrats of old.

besides, if the fillibuster was an evil tool....why have the repbulcians waited until NOW to stop it? where is the condemnation for them?

[siceone]

I love how you don't appreciate the nature of the information. did you know that?

[bigpoppanils]

I love how you don't appreciate the nature of the information. did you know that?

I don't appreciate the nature of the information because it is WRONG.

it came into being in 1806, not 1841.

http://www.factcheck.org/article317.html

it was first used by Senator Thomas Hart Benton as an attmept to block a banking bill.

http://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/briefing/Filibuster_Cloture.htm

[italia23]

Ehh...as a registered Rep, I don't really buy this

[siceone]

Noted

[mfiorellino]

For all the Republicans bitching about the fillbuster must have short memories. When Clinton was in power the Republicans used the fillibuster a few times to block some judicial appointments of his. One of the most prominent Republicans to fillibuster a Clinton appointee was no other than Bill Frist-the current Senate majority leader. The same guy that's trying to end fillibusters. How ironic is that?

[chris817]

For all the Republicans bitching about the fillbuster must have short memories. When Clinton was in power the Republicans used the fillibuster a few times to block some judicial appointments of his. One of the most prominent Republicans to fillibuster a Clinton appointee was no other than Bill Frist-the current Senate majority leader. The same guy that's trying to end fillibusters. How ironic is that?

They did not use a fillibuster, they just never got the appointee out of hearings.

Different tactic same premise