Patrick Leahy, Chairman of the Senate Juciary Committee, has essentially refused to do so for a year, with no indication when or if he will ever hold hearings.
This article supports Leahy. DON’T GIVE BUSH’S JUDGES A HEARING. Judge Not
This article attempts to give both sides (although I think it tilts toward the pubbies.) GOP, Dems Spar Over Judicial Nominees
My view is that the Senate has a Consitutional obligation to advise on judicial nominees. Their method of getting information in order to advise is to hold hearings. The Democrats want to get something in exchange for holding hearings. In effect, the Democratic Senators are asking for a quid pro quo for merely doing their job.
Maybe Bush should demand a quid pro quo for turning on the air conditioning in the Senate Ofice Building. That might be a decisive bargaining chip!
I do not see a quid pro quo arrangement here. The Senate Judiciary Committee is refusing to hold hearings on the most contoversially extremist of Bush’s nominees. (BTW, did you get your labels reversed? It sounded like the Insight reference was slanted towards the Republicans, while the other one seemed to be doing a political cost-benefit analysis for both parties.)
The constitutional requirement is that the Senate advise and consent (or of course withhold consent) on the President’s nominees. The Judiciary Committee hearings are merely a way to determine more fully the views and stances of the nominees, and are in no way mandated (in fact, having nominees testify dates as a standard practice only to Harlan Fiske Stone).
Also, your last line reflects both a misunderstanding of our Government and a prejudiced partisanship that is inappropriate.
Mr. Bush cannot force the Congress to do anything except convene and listen to the State of the Union speech (and I suppose the latter could be limited to two presiding officers and a quorum). Either those buildings are under the control of Congress or they would quickly be moved there by a 435-0, 100-0 vote if the President attempted to use any control he may have over them through G.S.A. to coerce Congress into doing his bidding.
Our national government consists of a President and Vice-President elected through an indirect popular choice nationwide, his appointees to direct and to carry out particular areas of the execution of our laws, 435 Representatives and 100 Senates selected from districts and from states respectively, and a bunch of federal judges appointed by the President with the consent of the Senate. To see any part of this as in charge of the whole is to misrepresent the reality that has been defended by the blood of good men.
The Democratic Senators’ job, like Mr. Bush’s, is to ensure that good judges without personal agendas get named to the federal judgeships. If he chooses to make choices that don’t fit those criteria one way, their duty is to prevent those choices from taking office, just as was the case the other way. (Though I must say that Senator Helms acted in what appears to be a prejudiced manner in blocking Mr. Clinton’s appointments of politically moderate black men to the Circuit Court serving my state.)
Incorrect. Under the Constitution, the President has an obligation to obtain consent from the Senate prior to appointing judges to the federal bench. Under the Constitution, the Senate doesn’t have to do jack.
Wouldn’t work.
Congress runs its own affairs, including building maintenance and operations for its office buildings (they also exempt themselves from most employment laws.) Bush has nothing to do with turning on the air conditioning.
OTOH, Congress controls the purse strings. They are the ones with the power to turn off the air conditioning at the White House.
During the last several years of the Clinton administration (a duly elected administration by a majority of the people without the removal of 20,000 black people from the Florida voting rolls because they had the same names as Texas felons) the Chair of the Judiciary Committee Orrin Hatch refused to hold hearings on virtually all Clinton nominees saying that they were not conservative and wouldn’t get hearings. Fast forward to when the shoe is on the other foot (and thank you for once again not pointing out that the shoe is on the other foot) since the Democrats have been in charge of the Senate, the pace of judicial confirmations has increased. The Democrats are well within their rights under the Hatch doctrine to refuse to hold any hearings at all because Bush appointments are not liberal.
This is the same thinking that Sen. Jesse Helms, while chair of the foreign relations committee refused to hold hearings on Clinton’s appointment of Republican Governor of Mass William Weld as Ambassador to Mexico because he wasn’t conservative enough to satisfy Jesse Helms.
Now I’d like to say that this is simply payback and the Dems are finishing what the Reps started, and ha, ha, ha. But it isn’t as simply or as satisfying as that.
Judicial appointments should not be political at all. Since the nomination of Robert Bork, Republican judicial appointments have tended to be highly political and polarizing, particularly at the Supreme Court level. Bork, Rhenquist elevated, Thomas, Scalia, etc. Not all, but many. The last thing you want when you have to go to court is a judge with an axe to grind against you (its not quite as upsetting when it is for you, but still unjust). The Republicans have political litmus tests in judicial appointments (abortion, privacy rights, search and seizure, etc.) that are turning our courts from impartial abiters of the law into policy enforcement bodies, no different than the legislative branch. The refusal to waste United States Senate Judicial Committee time on hearings for the Rev. Pat Robertson’s hand picked political hacks (or whoever is choosing these bozos) is fully justified on the grounds that they are simply too political and not judicially tempermented, or under the Hatch doctrine.
This infuriates me, and infuriated me just as much when Clinton was in office and the shoes were on the other feet.
Washington politicians hold the entire justice system hostage by refusing to appoint judges. Both sides are to blame – the president (democrat or republican) for putting forth at least some candidates he knows the Senate will never approve, and the Senate (democrat or republican) for bottling up the confirmation of judges.
Meanwhile, cases throughout the federal system languish unheard. Twelve percent of federal judgeships are currently vacant – twelve percent. And that is directly attributable to the refusal of the Senate to confirm candidates – plus, fewer and fewer people are applying, due to the unpleasantness of the confirmation process.
It is nothing more or less that an undermining of the intergrity of the entire judicial system, because there is justice for none when cases are not heard. And it is a direct result of politicking, for which both parties are equally to blame – they stuck it to our candidates, now we’re in power and we’ll stick it to theirs. I find it absolutely shameful.
I disagre with that, DPWHITE, and I think your bias is showing pretty clearly. As I have said, there is no white hat in this scenario, both parties are equally to blame for the situation, and neither seems willing to give way. Meanwhile justice is denied because no one hears the cases. This is rapidly approaching a constitutional crisis, as the right to speedy trial, or trial at all, is impinged when cases take literally years to be decided.
Republicans would be just as happy to say (and did say) “The refusal to waste United States Senate Judicial Committee time on hearings for the Rev. Jesse Jackson’s hand picked political hacks (or whoever is choosing these bozos) is fully justified on the grounds that they are simply too political and not judicially tempermented, or under the Hatch doctrine.”
“Since the nomination of Robert Bork, Republican judicial appointments have tended to be highly political and polarizing, particularly at the Supreme Court level”
Right. And we all know how unpartisan and cooperative those democrats are. Showing your colors, DPWHITE?
Ever since Bork this is the way things have worked. Frankly, I don’t want a very liberal OR very conservative judiciary, and I think this process is a good thing, that is, rooting out ideologues and replacing them with moderates who think out issues before making judgements on them rather than merely following a preset dogma. Both Dems and Reps share some blame here, but I think the Dems are less likely to torpedo moderates than the GOP.
In practice, a “moderate” can fall into any of 3 categories:
A liberal who occasionally throws a bone to big business (John Paul Stevens, David Souter)
A conservative who KNOWS how stupid and unjustifiable the Warren Court’s decisions were, but who lacks the cojones to overturn them. (Anthony Kennedy)
A liberal who figures the Warren Court gave the Left everything they ever wanted, and then some. Knowing there’s virtually nothing more to be done, he’s content to use his vote merely to protect the Warren Court’s legacy, rather than to push America farther to the Left. (Steven Breyer, Ruth Ginsburg.)
**Not so. Clinton never got a majority. In both 1992 and 1996, Clinton’s percent of the vote was lower than Bush’s in 2000.
Only slightly true. Hearings were delayed to a degree, but Clinton’s nominees did get hearings and the overwhelming majority were approved.
Can you supply a cite? BTW 2 of the “Bush” judges approved were Clinton nominees, who hadn’t been approved at the end of Clinton’s term. Bush courteously re-appointed them. (This was a courtesy seldom if ever extended by any prior President.)
Hatch was wrong to delay. The Dems are wronger to delay more. What a defence: “The pubbies behaved badly, and we’re only behaving a little more badly.”
The Pit has a thread suggesting that posting at the SDMB be at a 3-year old level. That’s exactly the level Patrick Leahy is at. “Mommy, Orrin hit me first!”
That was a disgusing, but commmon, use of Senatorial priviledge. However, Leahy is at a new level of incivility – refusing to hold hearings for nearly all the judges indefinitely.
Now I’d like to say that this is simply payback and the Dems are finishing what the Reps started, and ha, ha, ha. But it isn’t as simply or as satisfying as that.
But look at the hacks, such as Clinton’s choice of Gladys Kessler.
Wait a minute. I had a cite showing that Gladys Kessler is a hack here. Which Bush appointees do believe are “hacks” and where is your evidence. I bet you have none. Here’s a hint. All of them were rated “well-qualified” or “qualified” by the liberally biased ABA.
If Bush’s nominees were hacks, Leahy would be only too happy to hold hearings and embarass the pubbies. That’s what he tried to do with Charles Pickering, but the move backfired, when Pickering turned out not be a racist. Leahy won’t hold hearings because the nominees are so well-qualified that the Dems would be embarassed if they rejected them.
I’d define a moderate as somebody who automatically looks at a case involving, say, abortion, and automatically decides on it based on preset pro-life or pro-choice views instead of looking at the merits of the case.
Of course, astorian, a moderate can also be someone who looks to the facts of the case, and applies the relevant laws, constitutional provisions and precedent to those facts, without pre-ordaining the outcome.
This raises an interesting question. What if some federal official simply refused to do his job. E.g., suppose the President just didn’t nominate any judges, Ambassadors, etc., didn’t pay attention to the military, didn’t bother to execute the laws, etc. I think such a President would be ignoring his Consitutional duties, although he might not have violated any specific provision.
Similarly, I think the writers of the Consitution contemplated that the Senate would indeed provide “advice and consent,” even though the words do not explicitly say so.
AFAIK this describes every single one of Bush’s nominees. I have seen no evidence or even a claim that any particular nominee has a record that would suggest otherwise.
Wait a sec. I fully acknowledge that the system is utterly screwed up, but how do you come to the conclusion that the Democrats are acting worse than the Republicans did under Clinton?
According to your own links, the (Democratic( Senate has reviewed and approved more of Bush’s nominees in the past 12 months than the (GOP) Senate did in all of Clinton’s last term. Further, the (Dem) Senate has approved a considerably higher percentage of Bush’s picks than the (GOP) Senate did of Clinton’s picks.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t compromise the heart of the American government? In other words, if a Democratic Senate is holding up Bush’s nominees, then Bush should give something to the Dems to get his nominees through.
I thought that this sort of dealmaking was not just not the norm, but the intent of the checks and balances system: that the interested parties come to a mutually beneficial compromise on what they want to accomplish. That you have oppositional sides in the system provides some measure of security that any deal they reach won’t go to either extreme.
If Bush is unwilling to deal with the Democrats in the Senate, doesn’t that make him at least as obstructionist?
Basically, I agree with Jodi that the situation is wrong. The Democrats serve the nation poorly by playing the Republican game.
Still, there is the same sort of delicious irony in watching a clearly partisan whine that “It’s not fair; they are doing what we did.” as in watching the Reaganites be aghast that Clinton could lie to the American public and keep his ratings high, just as his mentor Reagan did.
