The bill had no trouble exceeding the 60-vote threshold needed for passage after Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) hammered out an agreement late Tuesday. Mindful of Monday’s 777-point drop in the Dow Jones Industrial Average, the two Senate leaders had worked unusually closely and quickly to cobble together a compromise in consultations with House leaders and the White House.

Their work was helped along by two key changes in the bill: An increase in Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation coverage of bank deposits, from $100,000 to $250,000, as well as extensions of popular tax credits and a freeze on the expansion of the Alternative Minimum Tax, all in an effort to coax more support from wavering GOP House members.

“This hasn’t been standard procedure over the last couple of years, but there's been really hard work with the Republicans,” Reid told reporters. “Sen. McConnell and I have worked hard to get [the] point where we are today on this most important piece of legislation … Inaction is not an option we have. This is not a bailout for Wall Street; it's a bailout for our country.”

Earlier in the day, McConnell predicted “a significant bipartisan victory on the rescue plan.”

“This is about Main Street and not Wall Street; it's about unlocking the frozen credit markets and getting America's economy moving again,” he said.

The Senate’s action was a dramatic and rare move that circumvented a constitutional requirement that tax legislation must originate in the House. Senate leaders are skirting that by using a House bill already in the Senate as the vehicle for the financial plan.

Rank-and-file members from both parties said their constituents have a better understanding of the risk to the credit market, and they cited the fact that the bill has been significantly improved from the Bush administration’s original Sept. 18 proposal.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) said she has received 82,000 calls or e-mails from constituents opposed to the plan, and only 5,000 supporting it. Yet she said most people are only beginning to understand the ramifications.

“They’re beginning to understand that their job is involved. Their money market is involved. Their savings are involved,” Feinstein said. “People saw the market drop, they’re beginning to talk to their employer, they’re beginning to understand what happens once credit freezes and you can’t get that credit to pay your employees.”

Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) also said the auto industry in his state is critically worried about consumers’ ability to get auto loans.

“There’s enough pressure already,” Levin said.

Both presidential candidates voted for the measure, and Democratic nominee Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) even made a late-afternoon floor speech urging passage. An Obama aide said the candidate flew to Washington from Wisconsin and was leaving later in the evening for Michigan.

“Let’s do what’s right for the country at this time,” Obama said.

Republican opposition in the Senate also eased. Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), a fiscal conservative who routinely acts to slow legislation he perceives as hastily conceived, supported.

“In my entire congressional career, there will never be a vote anywhere close to this vote,” he said. “This is a time when you must stand and do what’s best for the country long-term, even though it goes against your gut, because the consequences of not acting are so horrendous.”

Not all opposition was gone, however — Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) slammed the bill in a harsh floor speech, saying it represents the government leading the country “into the depths of socialism.