Every democracy deliberates differently. The wrong opinion can earn a lawmaker a bloody nose in the Ukrainian Verkhovna Rada, a fire extinguisher to the face in the South Korean National Assembly, and a strong reprimand in the U.S. Senate.
For questioning the character of her colleague, aspiring Attorney General Jeff Sessions, Sen. Elizabeth Warren was found in violation of the chamber’s rules and summarily silenced by Republicans. A ready-made martyr, Warren has already attracted gushing sympathy since last night.
But in the hysteria, an important warning from Sen. Marco Rubio was missed. The former presidential candidate cautions that the inability to debate could represent an existential threat to the greatest deliberative body in the world. And he might have a point.
Apparently after watching Warren attack Sessions, Rubio began to worry that America was at risk of following the example of her democratic cousins. “Turn on the news and watch those parliaments around the world where people throw chairs and punches at each other,” the Florida senator warned his colleagues, “and ask yourself how does that make you feel about those countries?” Though stopping short of equating Warren’s peaceful words with those violent actions, he warned that “we’re flirting with it in this body and we’re flirting with it in this country.”
In a vacuum, that seems overwrought. In context, though, it’s much more apparent.
The same intolerance that defines the partisan politics in Washington fuels the violent protests sweeping elite liberal college campuses today. An unwillingness to advance beyond ad-hominem attacks makes discussion impossible. Rubio’s right when he says that we’ve become “a society incapable of debates.” Reasonable people don’t seem to have reasonable disagreements anymore. After all, the biggest argument of 2016 ended with broken glass, burnt cars, and busted skulls.
As bad as politics has gotten, a street fight in the Senate is still difficult to imagine. And in all likelihood, the 66-year-old minority leader won’t be socking the 74-year-old majority leader anytime soon. But the gridlock is already on full display.
Elder statesmen from both parties haven’t lived up to the responsibility of the Senate. The upper chamber bears little resemblance to the one James Madison described in Federalist No. 63 as a check on the nation’s “temporary errors and delusions.” Instead, it’s an echo chamber where senators read prepared remarks in hopes one of their better lines makes it into the talk show highlight reel.
It’s hard to disagree with Rubio after surveying the current state of the Senate. “We’re reaching a point in this republic,” he warned, “where we’re not going to be able to solve the simplest of issues because everyone is in a corner where everyone hates everybody else.” While nobody’s throwing punches yet, maybe Rubio’s prediction is right.
Philip Wegmann is a commentary writer for the Washington Examiner.
