The Filibuster

Smith goes to Washington” is an accurate depiction of our government today. In the film, lobbyist control the senators and decide how the legislators in their control will vote. Lobbyists do all in their power to stop any senator that attempts to resist their agenda. Mr. Smith ignores the threats that are made by lobbyists, and continues to do what is right. This leads to many false accusations against Mr. Smith, and another senator attempts to get Mr. Smith out of office with more lies. Not only do lobbyists directly attack Mr. Smith, they also attack any press that portrays him favorably. Many similar scenarios occur in the U.S. government today, and lobbyists have more power than legislators do. The government is full of corrupt legislators, and more honest people like Mr. Smith should be elected to fix the

The main plot of the movie, Mr. Smith goes to Washington is a conflict between Jeff Smith, Senator Paine, and Jim Taylor. A senator of a state passed away causing a new senator needing to be appointed. Jim Taylor a local publicist who had pull around the Senate, pressured the governor to select Jefferson Smith. He was appointed as the new Senator of the State, because everyone thought that he was incompetent, naive, and would not get in their way. However when Smith passed a clever bill that got in the way of Jim Taylor’s scandal, Jim and Senator Paine tried to do whatever they could to get Jeffrey expelled from the Senate.

The film, “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington,” presents the Senate in a little different fashion than that of the Senate today in real life. The first obvious difference is that the Senate in the movie is still elected by the state legislature, basically the Governor, meaning that the setting of the film would have to be sometime before 1911 and the passage of the 17th amendment Senate] The difference is that today Senators are directly elected by the popular vote of the people.

1. A member of the House of Representatives or the Senate formally proposes the bill

This is reminiscent of interest groups tugging the government's attention and pocketbook towards their causes. The most direct connection to the government is at the very beginning of the movie when the governor of Smith’s state must appoint a senator to fill a vacancy. Under the Seventeenth Amendment, if a vacancy occurs due to the death or resignation of a senator, in most states, the governor of that state can directly appoint a senator until the next election. Another direct connection was the committee which investigated Smith, now called the Ethics Committee. One of the biggest connections to government was Smith’s use of a filibuster to protest the proposed dam. There is a man from CBS news giving a radio broadcast who reads the rules of a filibuster, that the senator cannot stop talking and cannot take a seat while they are talking or they will lose the floor. Another connection was between government and the press. In Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, the press uses the tactic of framing, twisting the headlines to suit their point of view. One of the other newspapermen quips that the stories about Smith are “Taylor made.” Framing is the technique of putting importance on a certain issue and giving it meaning to suit the media point of view. Taylor was against Smith, so

Congressional gridlock has been around for centuries in Congress and does not seem to be changing anytime soon. Congressional gridlock refers to the inaction of the government and failure to make a decision or legislative law that satisfy the needs of the people. This inaction of the government and stagnation occurs when two parties cannot agree on a single matter, and they cannot come to a good agreement on how or when the law is going to be passed, thus leaving complex problems in the nation unhandled. Congressional gridlock does not just come and take over the government on its own, though. It is evident that congressional gridlock is a major problem in the American government that needs to be addressed because there are so many root causes that the government fails to fix including gerrymandering and a lack of “bridge-builders.” Solutions to these causes that have yet to be made include improving the system of checks and balances and reducing representative dynamics and some of the nation’s most pressing problems that should not even be examples of congressional gridlock include climate change and the gun laws issue.

Filibuster in short is an action that the Senate uses to prolong or procrastinate passing a bill making it to a law. This can definitely contribute to gridlock. Congressional gridlock can be traced back many years. Some seem to think it all started when the political parties changed.

In 1789, the Senate and House of Representatives ordered a rule where only a majority vote was needed to conclude a debate. Although the House of Representatives kept that rule, the Senate got rid of it in 1806 without replacing it with another. This soon led to the opening idea of a filibuster. The initial purpose for a filibuster was to ensure that the minority opinions were apprehended and understood. Currently, some people still regard the filibuster as a strategy to protect the right of free speech and minorities.

This docility and willingness to vote according to the older Senators was most likely caused by the new Senators’ fear of the political bosses. Mr. Smith, however, was sheltered from knowing that the political bosses even existed and, as a result, was not afraid to stand up for his beliefs. Mr. Taylor, a typical political boss of Smith’s time, had extreme power in his state and was able to tilt the public opinion of Senator Smith. He did this through his control of the state media and connections within the government. Taylor concocted evidence with the help of his government connections alleging that Smith owned the property intended for the boy’s camp and was only promoting the camp bill so that he could sell his own property to the government at a high price. Taylor then publicized these false accusations against Smith in the newspapers that he controlled, thus persuading public opinion and ultimately causing Smith to be accused of wrongdoing by a Senate committee. Throughout this entire entourage, Smith was too inexperienced and naive to stand up against Taylor’s political machine and resorted instead to crying at the Lincoln Memorial. Smith only returned to the Senate after Saunders convinced him that he should fight for his rights. This situation ultimately proved once again that Senator Smith was too naive to be an effective Senator. Smith did not realize that the other Senators were inclined to believe the accusations against his character, and therefore,

Congressional gridlock in the United States is at a high currently, doubling since the 1950s. Gridlock is the slowing of the legislative processes due to the difficulty of congressional officials to agree on certain bills and or laws. Gridlock makes the passage of legislation time consuming and hardly any progress can be accomplished. This is how Congress acquired the nickname “Do Nothing Congress.”This usually occurs when both parts of Congress, the House of Representatives and the Senate, are of opposing parties. This then makes the President have the final say.

It all started when a young man that goes by the name of Jefferson Smith was elected to the United States senate unbeknownst of what was to come and was way in over his head. Jefferson Smith started off as a boy ranger when he was younger and was very prideful in the United States of America. He eventually gets elected to the senate of the United States but is woefully naive and is ridiculed by most of the other senators. One senator however, that went by the name of Joseph Paine who was also Smith's father friend took Smith under his wing to teach him the ins and the outs of being a senator. Senator Joseph Paine however, is secretly corrupt. Smiths naivety allows him to be made a fool out of in the press and in the newspaper. Senator Joseph Paine’s daughter Susan, is a love interest of Smith. Problems erupt when Joseph Paine suggests that Smith propose a bill to keep him occupied. With the help of his secretary, Clarissa Saunders, Smith suggests a bill to open up a boys camp in his home country with a loan from

On the other hand, there are a lot of cons to filibusters too. It is true that having the power to filibuster helps ensure the voices of the minority but it can also mean that having the power to filibuster ensures the tyranny of the minority. Because the size of the senate is not based on the size of the population of each state, every state gets two senators. It is now possible according to Jean Edward Smith, “for the senators representing the 34 million people who live in the 21 least populous states — a little more than 11 percent of the nation’s population — to nullify the wishes of the representatives of the remaining 88 percent of Americans. (Smith, 2009). This is completely the opposite of what the framers wanted, they wanted the government to represent the people not a small portion of the people. This is very dangerous because now if ever the more populous states wants to pass a bill on an issue regarding their states population, the more sparse states

Congressional gridlock is not a modern invention in the world of politics. Alexander Hamilton use to complain about the deadlock “flaw” in the design of Congress. In politics, “Congressional gridlock” is a situation in Congress where there are complications in passing laws for the people. Gridlock could be prevented if we had a democracy for the majority and unified. While many view this as frustrating, gridlocks are starting to become a political norm. This leads to a divided government. Congressional gridlock in the states has become an everyday topic that nobody really understands what to do. The creation of gridlock is seen every day. The failure that Congress comes with when trying to agree upon the nation’s budget, or have the right

Desperate situations call for uncoventional actions. In the video “The Devils Miner” Basilio Vargas a 14 year old boy who works in the trecharerous, labor-intensive and grueling, Cerro Rivo Silver Mines takes the responsibility of an adult at a young age. Basilio takes the father figure of his family working to provide basic needs for his family: shelter, clothing, and food. If Basilio, a mature and determined 14 year old can take on the positon of being head of the household, then a child who has the mental and physical capactiy to work can start crontributing to his family. If you are like Basilio, fatherless and have sibilings to support, the older sibiling should rise to the occasion to provide for his or her family. A child who is

The blocking of legislation is nothing new to the Republican party. According to the article Why Washington’s Tied Up in Knots, Republicans have been blocking legislation since the late nineteen sixties, where they blocked a little less than ten percent of major legislation using the filibuster tactic. The filibuster was a rare thing to behold, on average only occurring once every ten years, until during Bill Clinton's term in which nearly fifty eight filibusters had been enacted by the Republican party. The number of filibusters has nearly doubled in just the past year alone, with a whopping one thirty eight filibusters (United States Senate), all instigated by the Republican party to block as many of President Barack Obama's initiatives as possible, including the delay and possible destruction of the all important health care bill.