Senate needs remote voting

The Senate Democratic caucus was hit with a pair of unsettling health developments last week. Late Tuesday afternoon, a spokesman for Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont announced that Leahy had been taken to a Washington hospital for observation after feeling unwell. This was done at the recommendation of the Capitol’s attending physician, “out of an abundance of caution.”

After a few hours, Leahy had been evaluated and released. He “looks forward to getting back to work,” his spokesman reassured the public. Leahy, 80, later attributed the episode to muscle spasms and said he had been given “a clean bill of health.”

On Wednesday evening, Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia announced that he was quarantining after possible exposure to the coronavirus. The senator had tested negative but would “be working remotely during his quarantine period,” his spokeswoman said, “out of an abundance of caution.”

With caution at the forefront of senators’ minds, the chamber’s new leadership should get serious about enabling members to vote remotely in the event of health emergencies.

Since the early days of the pandemic, there has been much debate about how to ensure that Congress can do its job, most notably when it comes to voting, in the event that the coronavirus makes it impossible for lawmakers to gather safely. Over the past year, members from both chambers and from both parties have expressed growing support for remote voting. Multiple bills have been introduced on the issue.

For a variety of reasons, neither House Speaker Nancy Pelosi nor Mitch McConnell, then the Senate majority leader, were initially keen on the idea. Many people, on and off Capitol Hill, have concerns about any measures that could erode lawmakers’ duty to meet face to face to deliberate and negotiate — which is a key reason why pre-pandemic proposals to move toward online voting met resistance.

But extenuating circumstances call for extenuating measures. In May, the House acknowledged the realities of the pandemic and made provisions for proxy voting. McConnell, by contrast, continued to insist that his chamber could navigate the crisis without such disruptive changes.

The current majority leader, Charles Schumer, should take a more pragmatic approach. If anything, the Senate’s new 50-50 split, which makes every member’s vote that much more critical, makes the need for a fallback plan for voting that much greater. Concerns about the effects on tradition and deliberation can be ameliorated by making any plan explicitly temporary and contingent on specific conditions being met. Schumer’s office acknowledged that this is “a serious issue” and told the Times editorial board that it is “looking into it.”

Already, the announcement of Warner’s quarantine has prompted speculation about whether his absence could delay Democrats’ attempts to move ahead with a coronavirus relief package using the process of reconciliation, which allows for budget-related measures to pass with a simple majority.

This will not be the last time this kind of question arises. Neither is the coronavirus crisis likely to be the last time that the health and safety of members raise concerns about their ability to gather safely. Congress must be able to get the people’s work done even when it cannot meet in person. It is time for the Senate to ensure that can happen.

DON’T PERMANENTLY FENCE THE CAPITOL

The acting chief of the Capitol Police, Yogananda Pittman, said Thursday that Congress must build permanent fences around the Capitol. The impulse is understandable: Pittman got the job after her predecessor failed to stop the Jan. 6 attack on the building by supporters of former President Donald Trump. However, the proposal must be weighed against the public interest. There are important reasons to find other ways of protecting the Capitol.

Washington is the seat and symbol of American democracy. Its great buildings, most of all the Capitol, are manifestations of the nation’s power and prosperity and of its peculiar form of government: of the people, by the people and for the people.

The Capitol complex is a place where Americans can go to watch their representatives, to speak with those representatives, to petition for the redress of grievances.

The building and its grounds also are part of the fabric of the city. Streams of bikers pass through on morning and evening commutes. Tourists gather for concerts on the lawn. When it snows, the front face of Capitol Hill becomes a popular sledding spot, with neighborhood children sometimes transforming discarded protest signs into makeshift sleds.

This is not just an amenity for neighbors and visitors. It is the tangible manifestation of the idea that the government is a part of American life, rather than something separate and apart.

In recent decades, while much of the federal government was encased in layers of security fencing, bollards and concrete barriers, Congress largely resisted the trend. The Capitol’s defenses were strengthened, but it remained possible for members of the public to walk the grounds and to pose for pictures on the front steps.

After the Jan. 6 attack, though, temporary fencing was hastily installed around the Capitol and the surrounding congressional office buildings — a tall black barrier topped with loops of razor wire and patrolled by armed troops. It has transformed the Capitol into a symbol of the nation’s fears.

The attack on the Capitol is sobering evidence of the need for stronger measures to protect members of Congress and the work of government. It cannot be dismissed as an aberration. But a permanent barrier is an inappropriate corrective.

The attack could have been prevented or mitigated in severity by the timely deployment of an adequate number of police officers and National Guard troops — in effect, a temporary barrier. Any similar threats in the future can and should be met in the same manner. The basic failure was one of policing. It was not a failure of architecture.

Poet Robert Frost had it right when he wrote, “Before I built a wall I’d ask to know/What I was walling in or walling out/And to whom I was like to give offense.” A wall would create a symbolic barrier between Congress and all of the American people, not just the minority that is unwilling to accept and obey the rules of the republic.

By taking down the temporary fencing around the Capitol as soon as possible, and by pursuing other measures to ensure the security of the building and all those who enter it, Congress can restore its full splendor as a symbol of American democracy.