The collapse of police-reform legislation in the U.S. Senate last week has drawn a pox-on-both-their-houses condemnation of Democrats and Republicans. But in refusing to negotiate, the ruling Republicans should be getting the lion's share of that criticism. In any case, this is one of those moments in history that must be seized. Both sides owe it to America to keep trying.

Senate Democrats and Republicans offered separate police-reform packages amid protests following the death of George Floyd, the unarmed Black man who died with a Minneapolis police officer's knee pressed firmly against his neck. Floyd's final words, "I can't breathe," have been heard dozens of times before in the recent history of African American deaths in police custody.

That's why Democrat senators' police reform package included a federal ban on police chokeholds and similarly deadly practices. Another major issue is "qualified immunity," the legal protection that police officers have from lawsuits by brutality victims or their survivors in most cases, no matter what those officers have done. The Democratic bill would properly limit that protection.

The Republican version of police reform would do neither. It would create "incentives" for local jurisdictions to refrain from using chokeholds, begging the question of why it doesn't just ban this clearly dangerous practice. As for protecting qualified immunity, it seems to be an outgrowth of the Republican instinct toward opposing plaintiffs' rights in most circumstances — which isn't a good instinct in this instance.

In any case, the GOP bill, as might be expected, was significantly weaker in terms of new police restrictions than the Democratic bill. To borrow from the tongue-in-cheek old phrase, this is why God made committees. It would have made perfect sense for representatives of the two parties to sit down in bipartisan fashion and hammer out a compromise bill that both could live with.

That's the common way of doing Senate business, but Majority Leader Mitch McConnell refused, choosing instead to offer up the weak-tea Republican bill as is, and demanding a vote before refinements could be considered. McConnell's Machiavellian tendencies are well known, and it isn't hard to see his game plan here: If the bill had gotten a vote, even though it was doomed to fail, his more vulnerable members could be on record as having voted for police reform. If the Democrats prevented a vote (which is ultimately what happened), McConnell could claim the other side stood against reform.

It's a smart strategy — unless, of course, you're actually interested in accomplishing reform.

That must not be the last word at a time when America, finally, is poised for real police reform. The Democrat-controlled House is offering its own bill that could form the basis of bipartisan negotiation across both chambers. This is the moment. Congress needs to get this done.

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