SPRINGFIELD – Activists who staged a rally Monday outside the Springfield offices of U.S. Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey were invited inside by staffers to discuss the Senate deadlock in confirming President Barack Obama’s Supreme Court nominee and other issues.
The demonstration was one of many across the country organized by MoveOn.org. The liberal advocacy group is calling for the Senate to hold a hearing for Judge Merrick Garland’s appointment to the high court. The body, which is controlled by the GOP, is tasked with confirming Supreme Court candidates nominated by the president.
Senate Majoirty Leader Mitch McConnell has said that no nominee for the nation’s top court put forth by Obama will get a hearing. He says that the next president elected in November should be the one to choose the next Supreme Court justice.
Soon after over a dozen activists gathered outside the federal office building in downtown Springfield at noon Monday, Mark Gallagher, Markey’s state director, greeted the group and invited them inside for a meeting.
Neither Warren nor Markey were in Massachusetts Monday.
Pat Fiero, one of the rally’s organizers, said though Warren and Markey have said publicly Merrick deserves a hearing, the message the Springfield gathering was sending was still important.
“We think it’s really important to make the point nationwide,” the Leverett resident said. To Markey and Warren, “we’re thanking them and saying ‘do your job’ to the senators who are not on board.”
And because of the stance of Massachusetts’s two Democratic senators, the scene inside was likely much different than what demonstrators might encounter at a Republican senator’s office.
The group – many of whom wore colorful buttons advertising liberal causes – met for over an hour with Gallagher and Warren aide Jonathan D’Angelo to discuss topics ranging from the Senate stalemate, to the Kinder Morgan pipeline to GMO labeling.
“We want to thank them … and pass on our encouragement for them to talk to their colleagues who don’t have such adherence to the Constitution,” Northampton resident Paki Wieland said at the meeting. “We would like to know what they say about this process, about the advise and consent – or lacktherof.”
As outlined in the U.S. Constitution, the president is charged with appointing Supreme Court justices with the “advise and consent” of the Senate. Nominees require a 2/3 vote by the Senate to be confirmed.
While many Democrats say that Republican senators are failing to do their jobs by refusing to give Garland a hearing, there are varying interpretations on the legality of such refusal.
“That’s a question that’s open for analysis, I suppose,” Gallagher said.
He said he would check with Markey staffers in Washington, D.C., on their interpretation of McConnell’s position.
Gallagher suggested that the activists at the meeting reach out to friends in other states to urge them to contact their Republican senators in an effort to get Garland a hearing.
“The U.S. Senate is a response-stimulated body, to a large extent,” he said.
Easthampton resident George Scheurer said the Senate deadlock is a sorry circumstance.
“As an enlisted Vietnam veteran, I am completely ashamed that the Republicans in Congress aren’t fulfilling the oath that I took,” he said.
He said that Markey and Warren ought to encourage Democratic Senate leaders to hold a “mock hearing” for Garland.
“You say, ‘if you won’t do your jobs, we will,’” Scheurer said. “It’s a way to keep the pressure and the focus on what needs to be done – shame them.”
Northampton resident and Raging Grannies member Cleo Gorman said she was inspired by the turnout at the meeting.
“This is a source of such hope and such inspiration that there’s so many of us, and yourselves, that are saying … ” she said, before breaking into song: “Give us back our Constitution.”
Gorman and other members of the singing social justice troupe continued their tune, which urged Republican Senators to follow their Constitutional duties of considering Garland as a nominee.
Chris Lindahl can be reached at clindahl@gazettenet.com