Susan Collins, the Republican senator from Maine, has always had about her the air of the schoolmarm. It didn’t surprise us that she was the person who at last discovered the secret to dealing with United States senators: treat them like kindergartners. During the government shutdown last weekend, Collins gathered a group of her colleagues to try to find a compromise agreement that would end the impasse. Thrilled, the press decided to call the group “centrist,” presumably because nearly all of them favor amnesty for illegal immigrants.
One problem immediately presented itself to Sen. Collins: Even centrist U.S. senators have a hard time shutting up. Ever demure, Sen. Collins didn’t put it that way, of course. She described the group as a “large number of loquacious people.” Her solution to all that loquacity was to produce something called a talking stick, a colorful beaded rod that a fellow senator had once given her. Any centrist who wanted to speak had to get hold of the stick and then relinquish it when another centrist wanted to speak. In such fashion did the centrists reach a compromise that appealed to both Charles Schumer and Mitch McConnell. The government reopened.
Sen. Collins’s stick originated with the Maasai in Africa, where it was used to bring order to unruly tribal councils. But it is best known in North America for its use in elementary schools. For decades, teachers who have faced “a large number of loquacious people” under the age of 10 have produced the stick as a lesson in speaking only when asked and listening when not speaking. It is altogether fitting, and about time, that our elected representatives learn these lessons as well.
We don’t mean to suggest that the United States Senate has become infantilized—only that in the Senate, infantilization seems to get the job done. If we’re lucky, the talking stick will be just the beginning. We look forward to the day when the Senate parliamentarian requires senators to enjoy nap time, snack time, and play time, and to use a sippy cup to swig their bourbon, and to keep their hands to themselves when they get all comfy in their jammies for filibuster time. Thanks to Sen. Collins, it could be a new era on Capitol Hill.
