Michael Bennet: “I thank my neighbor, the Senator from New Mexico, for his kind words and his leadership on this issue. I have been…”

“I thank my neighbor, the Senator from New Mexico, for his kind words and his leadership on this issue. I have been privileged to have the chance to cosponsor a constitutional amendment that I think responds very nicely to what he hears from his constituents, as I hear from mine, whether they are Republicans, Democrats, or Independent voters. I also want to thank the Senator from Rhode Island, Mr. Whitehouse, for organizing this time tonight and for his leadership over these many months. It is 8:45 p.m. tonight in Washington, DC, as we debate this bill. We are not actually debating the bill because we weren't even allowed to move to a debate on the bill. I can't tell you the number of times we haven't been able to do that. I am often struck by the fact that I think the Founding Fathers would have wanted us to debate all these bills and to vote up or down on each one and then to go home and explain to our constituents why we voted one way or why we voted another way. But here we are, not technically debating a bill, once again, because we haven't even been able to move onto a piece of legislation that historically has been and I hope will again become bipartisan. As I mentioned, it is 8:45 here. At home in Colorado, it is 6:45. It is dinnertime. Families are sitting around having dinner with their loved ones, much as I did when I was a boy.…”