EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY AMERICANS READ the Federalist Papers, their 19th-century grandchildren, the Lincoln-Douglas debates. To learn about the momentous struggle over the future of the U.S. judiciary, 21st-century Americans can watch “Save Phil,” an Internet cartoon currently showing at www.SavePhil.com. Protagonist Phil A. Buster is an anthropomorphized megaphone with fashionable blue sneakers, white Michael Jackson gloves, and large, expressive eyes. As cartoon mascots go, Phil is derivative: He looks like the offspring of Helping Hand, the Hamburger Helper icon, and Oven Mitt, who stumps for the Arby’s chain. But what Phil lacks in originality he makes up for in spunk, as he tries to whip up outrage at Senate Republicans’ attempts to end the filibuster (get it?) of judicial nominees.
The cartoon is an allegory. “It’s the job of checks and balances to make sure that no one gets too much influence,” Phil says, “but there are a few politicians who want to get rid of checks and balances by squashing little ol’ me.” At this point a giant, steel-gray robot, gnashing his jagged metal teeth and flailing his metal pincers, emerges from the Capitol dome like a nightmarish jack-in-the-box and yells: “No checks! No balances! One . . . party . . . rule!” The unnamed robot, whose dark suit and red tie recall a certain Senate majority leader, chases Phil and his friends Checks and Balanz through the city streets and into the suburbs. Checks, in dancing shoes and elegant satin gloves, falls behind; so too Balanz, but who can blame her? She’s wearing heels.
Yet Phil A. Buster escapes, because ordinary Americans–uneasily eyeing the pursuit from the safety of their homes–flood their senators’ offices with faxes and phone messages. Swamped by the deluge of paper, the evil robot can hardly move; he trips and falls, exploding into a million pieces. And therein lies the lesson: “If people tell the politicians to play fair and not change the rules,” Phil says, “we can save checks and balances.” Fade to black.
Since his April 5 unveiling by the Alliance for Justice–the liberal group that learned its chops opposing Robert Bork’s nomination to the Supreme Court–Phil and his friends have remained cult figures, but the marketing campaign has just begun. Last Thursday there was a “Save the Filibuster” rally at Georgetown University law school. Volunteers passed out buttons with pictures of the gang–Phil A. Buster, Checks, and Balanz–and handed out savephil.com T-shirts.
The rally had many fathers–or mothers, or legally sanctioned guardians, as the case may be. The Coalition for a Fair and Independent Judiciary, a consortium of groups opposed to President Bush’s judicial nominees, organized it and booked the room, a spacious wood-paneled hall on the 12th floor of the Gewirz Student Center. On April 20 the press office of the Democratic National Committee sent an email inviting everyone to the law school to hear a recruitment pitch from the managing partners of the firm Kennedy, Durbin, Schumer & Lieberman.
Those who arrived early watched men in jean shorts and black T-shirts construct a wrought-iron riser, draped in blue cloth, for the television crews. The room was filled with light, and rock music, accented with horns and keyboards, played in the background. A door led to a balcony overlooking the law school campus–a small cluster of glass and brick buildings occupying several blocks in an empty and decayed part of Washington not far from Union Station. At the far end of the room a small stage was flanked by signs reading “Protect Our Democracy: Preserve Checks and Balances.”
The students trickled in. Most had backpacks, swollen with books, slung over one or both shoulders. The first arrivals were shy and stuck to the room’s walls, like boys at a middle school dance. But once more people showed up and the music switched to Norah Jones, they began mingling. You could hear laughter in all directions. One Georgetown undergraduate said she had “an open mind” about the filibuster, and came to the rally just wanting “to check it out.”
Volunteers passed out signs. Most were simple marker-on-posterboard concoctions: “Stop the Partisan Power Grab” and “Save Our Courts” scrawled in orange and lime green Crayola. Others were slick and professional; laminated in black, red, and gold: “Never Go Back! Save Roe!” Representatives from the Feminist Majority Foundation had brought these; when complimented on having the nicest signs in the room, they giggled politely.
“They did a pretty effective color handout campaign,” said a third-year law student, referring to the rally’s organizers. “They handed out the flyers the other day,” he went on, “when there was a bunch of free beer out on the quad.” He paused. “That’s smart. Me, I’m just starstruck–you know, like, Ted Kennedy, WOW!”
He was about to be disappointed. When the senators took the stage Kennedy was missing; later, after the rally was over, a flack from the Coalition for a Fair and Independent Judiciary said that the senior senator from Massachusetts had been “tied up in committee.” Yet Schumer, Lieberman, and Durbin showed up, accompanied by Father Robert Drinan, the ex-Democratic congressman from Massachusetts who’s now a professor at Georgetown. The eminences were introduced by Barry Junker, a student at Georgetown Law, and Andrea Irwin, a law student at American University.
Once the introductions were over, Schumer, his tie loosened, played the pedant. “Let’s start with a little history,” he said. In 1999, President Bush promised groups that were “way, way, out there”–he pointed in the distance–that, if elected, they could choose the Bush administration’s court nominees. “Most of Bill Clinton’s nominees tended to be moderate,” Schumer said. But Bush’s picks–again he pointed–were “far out.” He gave some examples.
“One said that slavery was God’s gift to white people,” he said.
Boos.
“One said that the purpose of a woman was to be subjugated to her man.”
More boos.
“One said”–he paused, barely containing his shock–“there should be . . . no zoning laws.”
The crowd emitted a collective gasp.
Don’t give up the fight, Schumer exhorted. “We’re actually winning the hearts and minds of the American people.” He raised his eyebrows, as if he were surprised.
A few students slipped out of the room. Outside it started to rain.
“Don’t you think Chuck Schumer would make a great law professor?” Lieberman asked. This got a lot of laughs, so Lieberman entered his borscht-belt mode. He called Father Drinan “one of the great faith-based initiatives.” Then he smiled, leaned back, and said, “This is a great crowd.”
“I never thought I’d live to see the day where we held a rally in favor of checks and balances,” he continued. From the expressions on people’s faces, he wasn’t the only one. Lieberman kept his remarks short, invoking the Bible–“Justice, justice shalt thou do”–and issuing a warning: “There is no guarantee,” he said, “the Republicans will remain the majority in the Senate forever.”
Durbin, who is less famous than Lieberman and Schumer, introduced himself using the confessional language of an AA meeting. “My name is Dick Durbin,” he said. “And I am living proof that there is life after Georgetown Law School.” The students cheered, but quieted when Durbin went on to deliver a fiery speech on the “constitutional crisis” that awaits us if the Republicans end judicial filibusters. Once Durbin finished, the 100 or so students moved toward the elevators. One of them, who didn’t want to be quoted in The Weekly Standard, fearing prospective employers might read his name in these pages, expressed ambivalence. It didn’t really matter, he said, whether Majority Leader Frist deployed the nuclear option.
How’s that? I asked.
Well, he said, the corners of his mouth curling upward into a faintly sinister grin, “Almost everything that happens in Washington ends up being good for lawyers.”
Matthew Continetti is a staff writer at The Weekly Standard.
