Former U.S. Sen. David Pryor, D-Ark., said he filibustered for hours one night in the 1980s, forestalling several votes so U.S. Sen. Dan Quayle, R-Ind., could go to his son’s Little League championship baseball game.

Later in his Senate career, Pryor said a group of about 20 senators would hold potluck dinners every Sunday night at a different house, regardless of political party. Democrats and Republicans convivially dined together.

“We knew their children. We knew their dogs. We knew their parakeets,” Pryor said. “That helped us to bond as colleagues and friends. Politics was personal at that time, and it has to be personal again. We knew each other and we cared about each other. We fought on the floor against each other, but on Sunday nights we came together as friends. … Today, that doesn’t happen.”

Those were simpler times, Pryor told a crowd of about 100 people Tuesday night at the University of Arkansas’ Global Campus building in downtown Fayetteville. The topic of his address was Congress’ perceived inability to function.

Pryor served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1966 to 1973, as governor of Arkansas from 1975 to 1979 and in the U.S. Senate from 1979 to 1997. He is currently a member of the University of Arkansas System board of trustees.

“About 85 percent of Americans say our Congress is dysfunctional,” Pryor said. “It is something in our time and our generation that we have got to address. … More people distrust Congress today than at any time in our lifetime.”

Congress’ approval rating is at an all-time low of about 18 percent, Pryor said. It’s usually between 35 percent and 55 percent, he said.

Congress passed fewer bills in the last session than any other session in history, Pryor said. But some people think that’s a good thing.

“For example, if you were a Libertarian, you would say, ‘Wow, this is great. Congress isn’t passing all these new rules and regulations and laws that we have to abide by, that get in the way of business. We’re over-regulated. We’re overtaxed. We’re over-legislated. So this is good for Congress not to accomplish anything.’”

Pryor described the current era as one in which some people don’t want their elected officials to compromise or work with their counterparts in the opposing party. He described it like a hollowed-out apple, with the core missing.

“We are in a very, very strange moment in our history,” Pryor said.

Because of the need to constantly be fundraising, the day after a person wins election to Congress, they begin fundraising for the next race, Pryor said.

Pryor said the Senate race between his son, U.S. Sen Mark Pryor, D-Ark., and U.S. Rep. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., will be the most expensive race in Arkansas history. The election is Nov. 4.

During a question-and-answer session after his address, Pryor said the time will likely come where private contributions are no longer allowed in U.S. political campaigns.

“On campaign finance, if I could wave a wand, and I’m not advocating doing this, I want to make that clear, I would say that I think we will eventually come to a point in this country where private campaign contributions are no longer going to be around. I’ll just say that. I think we’re heading toward some sort of a federal financing. It also think it may be years to come.”

Pryor said no real change will occur in American politics until the campaign finance system is overhauled.

After the question-and-answer session, Pryor expanded on his comment.

“One of these days I think that we will have on the federal level, federal financing of campaigns, and I support that concept,” Pryor said. “I think private money and interest groups, I don’t want to say polluted campaigns but they caused a lack of balance in campaign finance.”

Pryor said that “one of these days we will see a scandal so big, so immense, so scandalous that people will say we’re not going to do this anymore, and we’re going to have a better system.”

Pryor’s talk was sponsored by the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute in UA’s College of Education and Health Professions.