People ask why the federal government hasn’t lifted a finger to stop the growing epidemic of gun violence, despite Americans’ demands for action and overwhelming support for common-sense reforms like universal background checks and bans on high-capacity magazines. They ask how we can stand by as the country suffers tragedy after tragedy and averages more than one mass shooting every single day. The answer once again: the filibuster.

If not for abuse of the filibuster, we would have passed major legislation addressing some of our country’s most pressing issues under President Obama: Millions of undocumented immigrants brought to this country as children would have a pathway to citizenship through the Dream Act; millions of Americans would have a government-run public option as part of health care reform; and the American Jobs Act and the “Buffet Rule” requiring the wealthy pay their fair share of taxes would be law, further strengthening the economy and helping to address the issue of income inequality.

If the Senate cannot address the most important issues of our time, then it is time for the chamber itself to change, as it has done in the past.

I didn’t come to this decision lightly. In bygone eras, the filibuster was a symbol of the Senate’s famed role as the cooling saucer for legislation and ideas from the more hot-tempered House of Representatives. The Senate was known as “the world’s greatest deliberative body,” a place where collegiality and compromise held sway and issues could be discussed rationally and agreements could be reached. The 60-vote threshold reflected those sentiments.

Sadly, we are not living in the same legislative world anymore.

As majority leader of the Senate, facing the strenuous obstruction of President Obama’s nominees by Republicans hoping to cripple his administration, I decided in 2013 to abolish the filibuster for most presidential appointees. Because of this change, we were able to confirm more of President Obama’s judicial nominees than we would have been able to otherwise, leaving President Trump fewer vacancies to fill.

I kept the filibuster in place for Supreme Court nominees and legislation, believing the filibuster was necessary for other Senate business because of the chamber’s deliberative nature. Republicans, after loudly denouncing the 2013 change, went a step further in 2017 and abolished the filibuster for Supreme Court nominees as well.

I previously assumed, perhaps wrongly, that the fever would eventually break — that Republicans would be forced by the American people to put their country above their party. I assumed the calls for action on critical issues would be heard — that collegiality in the Senate would prevail.