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“I know that what we did yesterday is absolutely in order,” Lankin argued in an interview. “There have been rulings in the past of the exact same scenario and the people opposite know it as well. There’s a little political theatre going on now.”

Photo by Adrian Wyld/CP

Lankin said other senators were made aware of her plans from the beginning. “It is antics. It is juvenile beyond belief,” she said.

Liberal MP Andrew Leslie was seen hanging about the foyer as senators voted — “I feel fantastic,” he declared. Liberal Sen. Jim Munson said, afterwards, “we’re on the right side of history.”

But Conservatives were having none of it. As the government seeks to pass key bills in the Senate this spring that the opposition has significant powers to delay, including on marijuana legalization, Housakos launched a declaration of war.

“If this is Justin Trudeau’s Senate, we are certainly trampling upon democracy. And we’re putting the government on notice today, with not being in there, that we are not going to tolerate this any further,” he said. “Today it’s on this particular bill. What’s next?”

Lankin said she thinks the Conservatives will try to delay the marijuana bill, especially after the events of this week. “They’re absolutely threatening that,” she said.

But Sen. Peter Harder, the government’s representative in the upper chamber, took a measured tone.

Asked whether he is worried about the legislative agenda since the Senate Conservatives put Trudeau’s government “on notice,” Harder said he hopes they will not seek to delay government bills.

“I would hope that we can move forward on government legislation at an appropriate pace, and I would hope that they would reconsider, if they have made those statements, to ensure that the business of the Senate is done respectfully and with full participation.”

• Email: mdsmith@postmedia.com | Twitter: mariedanielles