Can Anybody Around Here Pass a Law?

In any event, even if the House version of the measure, with no abortion language, were to prevail, the restriction would end up being in effect anyway, for the arcane reason that the House version does not contain its own funding mechanism.

That would bring the abortion restriction back into play, because it's a standard feature of spending bills. Abortion-rights groups are pressing Senate Democrats to make this stand in part to send the signal that enough is enough, in part to avoid entrenching the precedent of abortion restrictions spreading beyond appropriations measures.

"Over the years, we have lost virtually every battle that has been on this floor and we are tired of it," California Democrat Dianne Feinstein said in a revealing comment on the Senate floor on Wednesday. "So we are taking a stand and we are going to hold that stand." Yes, but at the expense -- potential expense -- of trafficking victims?

As of this writing, cooler heads in the Senate (Maine Republican Susan Collins and North Dakota Democrat Heidi Heitkamp) are seeking to craft a compromise. "If we cannot approve a bill to deal with human trafficking, then what will we be able to deal with?" Collins asked on the floor Thursday.

Good question.

The optimistic interpretation is that this episode, like the earlier showdown over homeland security funding, reflects the growing pains of a new majority. Under this view, it will take some time for Republicans to accommodate themselves to the reality that their seeming power is limited by the facts of the filibuster, the veto pen and, particularly in the House, their own ideological fissures.

Once that acceptance sets in -- or so the theory goes -- the two sides will be able to forge a relationship workable enough to accomplish the basic tasks of governing and, perhaps, make progress in the relatively few substantive areas on which they can agree.

I hope so. But episodes like the trafficking fight leave a toxic residue of anger and distrust. That a feel-good bill could leave everyone feeling so frustrated does not bode well for the legislative road ahead.

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Ruth Marcus' email address is ruthmarcus@washpost.com.