Mike Levin: “the Senate is in an unusual situation and we are dealing, I believe, with extreme wisdom. It is a very difficult…”

“the Senate is in an unusual situation and we are dealing, I believe, with extreme wisdom. It is a very difficult anomaly. It has never happened before that the Senate has had a 50/50 split of this nature at the beginning of Congress. The only thing that comes close was in 1953, which was very different because the Republicans had a majority in the beginning of the Congress and the 50/50 situation that existed only occurred in the second session of that Congress. The same party was in control throughout with the Vice President's vote in the second session, which had the majority in the first session. This is an unusual situation. It took wisdom and statesmanship on the part of our leaders to put together a resolution which would carry us through this very difficult point. Just like during the impeachment situation, the leadership was able to work out a process which allowed the Senate to function and to proceed in a manner that would allow us to have comity and civility, to avoid recrimination.”