Just by way of a reminder, once the House passes the reconciliation bill fixing the Senate health insurance reform bill, the fireworks begin anew in the Senate, where Republicans have promised a blizzard of amendments and/or points of order aimed essentially at creating a de facto filibuster where the "normal" filibuster would otherwise not be available to them.
But let's also recall what I thought they might be able to do about it:
There's an October 3, 1977 precedent from when Sen. Robert Byrd (D-WV) was Majority Leader, wherein faced with an exploitation of an old cloture rule loophole that allowed Senators to file the same sort of endless stream of amendments, even after cloture had already been invoked, he addressed the chair with this point of order, which was sustained by the chair:
I make the point that when the Senate is operating under cloture the Chair is required to take the initiative under rule XXII to rule out of order all amendments which are dilatory or which on their face are out of order.
The point having been sustained (and an appeal of the ruling tabled, which requires a simple majority vote), Byrd used his right of preferential recognition as Majority Leader to call up all the rest of the amendments one at a time, whereupon the chair ruled each of them out of order on its own motion. (Source - warning, PDF)
I would argue that if that point of order can be sustained for the post-cloture environment, when debate is limited to 30 hours, surely it should be sustained for the reconciliation environment, when debate is limited to just 20.
I believe the same point of order can and should be made and sustained -- if we even get that far, given what former parliamentarian Bob Dove had to say -- and that Harry Reid might then use his right to preferential recognition to call up all pending amendments, and have them ruled on immediately by the chair.
With that in mind, I offer you this bit of news from (subscription only) CQ:
Majority Whip Richard J. Durbin , D-Ill., reaffirmed that Democrats will move to block what they consider an excessive number of Republican amendments by seeking a ruling from the presiding officer — in consultation with Senate parliamentarian Alan Frumin — to limit votes once an unspecified number is held.
“There’s some point beyond which everyone knows that it’s all about stopping the bill, and it’s not about amending it. I hope we don’t face that. But if we do, you know, there is an opportunity for the chair to rule at some point,” Durbin said March 15.
Durbin said he hoped Frumin would declare excessive amendments “dilatory” and effectively put an end to floor votes on a reconciliation bill that would make changes to the Senate-passed health care overhaul bill (HR 3590). The House is currently drafting the reconciliation measure.
Do we take care of you at Congress Matters, or what?
Of course, there's also some bad news in the CQ article:
Durbin’s stance has unsettled moderate Democrat Ben Nelson of Nebraska, who said he would likely oppose any move to cut off amendments. Nelson compared such an effort to the “nuclear option” — a change in Senate rules threatened by then-Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn. (1995-2007), to skirt Democratic filibusters of President George W. Bush’s conservative judicial nominees. Frist’s plan unraveled under opposition from Nelson and other members of a so-called Gang of 14.
“I did not support that type of effort back then. And I would not support something like that now,” Nelson said.
Mark Begich, D-Alaska, also expressed qualms about cutting off amendments. “I might be a little uneasy about that. People need to have their voice,” he said.
Of course, the good news about the bad news is: it only takes a simple majority to uphold the ruling of the chair on something like this. But I'm sure they'll be discussing the issue in caucus meetings, and I doubt very much whether the intention is to cut things off early. They'll likely be erring on the side of letting Republicans overdo things before trying anything like this.
Will we ever really see it? Who knows? You'll have to stay tuned and watch. But at least you've read the program going into the show.