judicial nominees

After helping Elena Kagan sail through the Judiciary Committee, Chairman Leahy isn’t content resting on his laurels. Yesterday the Chairman censured his Republican colleagues for their obstructionism on lower profile but just as vital judicial nominations. When Republicans foiled his attempt to schedule discussion on 4th Circuit nominee Jane Stranch of Tenessee, who enjoys the bipartisan support of her home state Senators, Chairman Leahy called them out:

Senate Republicans have further ratcheted up the obstruction and partisanship that have regrettably become commonplace this Congress with regard to judicial nominees. We asked merely for a time agreement to debate and vote on the nomination. I did not foreclose any Republican Senator from voting against the nominee or speaking against the nominee but simply wanted a standard agreement in order to allow the majority leader to schedule the debate and get to a vote. This is for a nomination reported favorably by the Judiciary Committee over eight months ago with bipartisan support. Yet the Republican leader objected and blocked our consideration.

For anyone who still thinks that both parties engage in this kind of obstructionism when in the minority, Senator Leahy came prepared with statistics:

No one should be confused: the current obstruction and stalling by Senate Republicans is unprecedented. There is no systematic counterpart by Senate Democrats. In fact, during the first 2 years of the Bush administration, the 100 judges confirmed were considered by the Democratically controlled Senate an average of 25 days from being reported by the Judiciary Committee. The average time for confirmed Federal circuit court nominees was 26 days. The average time for the 36 Federal circuit and district and circuit court judges confirmed since President Obama took office is 82 days and the average time for Federal circuit nominees is 126 days. So when Republicans say that we are moving faster than we did during the first 2 years of the Bush administration they are wrong. It was not until the summer of 2001 that the Senate majority shifted to Democrats, but as soon as it did, we proceeded on the judicial nominations of President Bush, a Republican President. Indeed, by this date during the second year of the Bush administration, the Senate had confirmed 58 of his judicial nominations and we were on the way to confirming 100 by the end of the year. By contrast, Republican obstruction of President Obama's judicial nominees has meant that only 36 of his judicial nominees have been confirmed. We have fallen dramatically behind the pace set for consideration of President Bush's nominees.

…Indeed, when President Bush was in the White House, Senate Republicans took the position that it was unconstitutional and wholly inappropriate not to vote on nominees approved by the Senate Judiciary Committee. With a Democratic President, they have reverted to the secret holds that resulted in pocket filibusters of more than 60 nominees during the Clinton years. Last year, Senate Republicans successfully stalled all but a dozen Federal circuit and district court nominees. That was the lowest total number of judges confirmed in more than 50 years. They have continued that practice despite the fact that judicial vacancies continue to hover around 100, with more than 40 declared judicial emergencies.

As Chairman Leahy emphasized, these obstructionist tactics have rarely come with explanations. For example, Judge James Wynn, who was nominated first by President Clinton and then by President Obama and would become the first black Justice on the 4th Circuit, has been on anonymous hold for six months with no reason given.

Our judicial system can’t function properly without qualified judges on the bench. But Senate Republicans are leaving dozens of judicial vacancies open for purely political reasons. Good for Chairman Leahy for speaking out on this.

We talk a lot about the purely political motives Republican senators have in their efforts to slow down the confirmation process for President Obama’s judicial nominees. It’s easy to forget that who those nominees are—and when they start working— makes a huge difference. The Philadelphia Inquirer reported this weekend that nearly 40% of all federal judges currently on the bench were appointed by George W. Bush--who made a concerted effort to appoint judges with right-wing credentials, and, you might say, didn’t put much of a priority on gender or racial diversity.

Obama, in contrast, has returned to a more bipartisan appointment process and has a notably diverse list of appointees. But thanks to Republican obstruction, Obama’s appointees aren’t making it to the bench:

So far, nearly half of Obama's 73 appointments to the federal bench have been women, 25 percent have been African American, 11 percent Asian American, and 10 percent Hispanic. About 30 percent of Obama's nominees were white males. By contrast, two-thirds of George W. Bush's nominees were white males.

Obama's rate of appointing women and people of color is higher than those of any of his predecessors during the first year of their terms. But he is not the only one setting records.

According to a report by the Alliance for Justice, a liberal advocacy group: "The Senate confirmed both fewer nominees and a smaller percentage of nominees under President Obama than under any other previous five presidents during their first year in office."

Presidents Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan had 91 percent of their nominees confirmed in their first year in office. Since then, however, the figure has sharply declined, with George H.W. Bush getting 65 percent of his early judicial nominees confirmed, followed by Bill Clinton at 57 percent, George W. Bush at 44 percent, and Obama at 36 percent.

As recent events in the Fifth Circuit reminded us, it really does matter who ends up in federal judgeships. And Republicans, booted from control of the legislative and executive branches, are fighting tooth and nail to keep the courts.
 

In his opening comments, Lindsey Graham raises the agreement reached by the Gang of 14 and the standard they set: that filibusters of judicial nominees could be allowed only in extraordinary circumstances.

Senator Susan Collins has already said that she doesn’t think that the “extraordinary circumstances” threshold has been met by Senator Kagan’s nomination, which should be obvious to any impartial observer.

But we shouldn’t forget that most Republicans didn’t embrace the standard set by the Gang of 14. They argued that a filibuster of a judicial nominee was unconstitutional in all cases. It wasn’t about politics, they claimed. It was a principled commitment to the Constitution. Senator Sessions, for his part, was unambiguous about his stance.

“One of the many reasons why we shouldn't have a filibuster, an important one, is Article I of the Constitution. It says the Senate shall advise and consent on treaties by a two-thirds vote and simply 'advise and consent' on nominations,” he said in a 2003 floor statement. "Historically, we have understood that provision to mean -- and I think there is no doubt the Founders understood that to mean -- that a treaty confirmation requires a two-thirds vote, but confirmation of a judicial nomination requires only a simple majority vote."

So none of the Republicans would ever try to filibuster a judicial nominee. Right?

Tuesday’s batch confirmation of 60 patient Obama administration nominees was an encouraging break from Senate Republicans’ current unprecedented obstruction efforts, but it seems it might not yet represent the turning over of a new leaf.

NPR yesterday counted 69 Senate holds on executive branch and judicial nominees—most of them anonymous.

Included in this holding pen, our friends at Alliance For Justice have noticed, is every judicial nominee who’s been cleared for a floor vote, including 13 who received no opposition in committee.

Sen. Claire McCaskill now has gotten 68 Senators to sign a pledge to not participate in anonymous holds and to call for the abolishment of the practice. Only 10 Republicans have signed on.
 

Maybe the Right Wing is finally realizing that after Citizens United, “judicial activism” just doesn’t cut it for slamming judicial nominees who aren’t willing to overturn a century of settled campaign finance law. So they’re trotting out a brand new talking point to fill the void: “outcome based” judging.

CQ-Roll Call highlighted the up-and-coming new meme:

As part of that effort, Republicans beginning this week will look to use some of Obama’s previous lower court picks — particularly the nomination of Goodwin Liu to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit — as adhering to a liberal, “outcomes-based” philosophy rather than a constitutionalist approach.

What’s it mean? Allow us to translate: “Liberal activist!! Legislate from the bench!! Empathy! Wise Latina!!!! OMG OMG OMG!!!!”

Yes, “outcome based” is just the latest in a long line of virtually meaningless epithets aimed at any judicial nominee who disagrees with the gospel according to Robert Bork.

Is there a debate to be had between different philosophies towards applying the Constitution? Sure. Justice Scalia and Justice Breyer have it all the time. But this isn’t it. In the upcoming confirmation process for Justice Stevens’s successor, the American people deserve a conversation about the Court and the role it plays in the lives of ordinary people. Unfortunately, it seems like the GOP is planning the same warmed-over sound bytes we’ve been getting for years.
 

Last night, Patricia Smith, President Obama’s choice to be Solicitor of the Department of Labor, passed an important procedural hurdle: the Senate decided to vote on her nomination.

What’s remarkable is that, unlike past attempts to block votes on executive branch nominees, the vote was entirely along party lines.  Even the so-called moderates in the Republican party, like Senators Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe, voted against allowing an up or down vote on a second-tier executive branch nomination.

For a party that railed against the use of the filibuster even in the case of judicial nominees, the hypocrisy is remarkable.

Perhaps, you think, Patricia Smith is far outside the mainstream, and the GOP was using it’s last tactic to stop an extreme nominee. 

Nope.  

But filibustering a nominee like Smith for a position most people have never heard of in a department that is rarely in the news still requires some justification. After all, most of the GOP senators have been around long enough that they served during a time when such a filibuster would be unimaginable.

So they called Smith a liar.

Sen. Mike Enzi (R-Wy.), the ranking Republican on the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, led the pack, decrying her "lack of candor" and cited "discrepancies in her testimony." The issue -- which was really not, of course, the issue -- centered on a small pilot program in New York called Wage Watch, which aims to educate workers about the minimum wage is and when they are entitled to overtime. Republicans, during committee hearings, insisted that it was a Big Labor plot, but Smith said the idea had been generated within her office. It was later shown that apparently a labor representative had suggested it to an employee, who then suggested it to Smith.

The GOP also lambasted Smith for categorizing the pilot program as "educational" rather than "enforcement." Democrats pointed out that the distinction was an irrelevant one: The purpose of the education was to improve enforcement efforts.

The pilot program cost $6,000. Smith manages some 4,000 employees and oversees an $11 billion annual budget.

The conclusion is obvious.  The GOP, including so-called moderates, are obstructing nominations for the sake of obstruction, throwing sand into the gears of government and attempting to hobble the Obama administration by any means necessary.  That tactic is irresponsible and unacceptable.  Americans deserve better.

Today, there was a panel at the Religious Action Center discussing the role of religious communities in debates over judicial nominees. Joi Orr, program assistant with People for the American Way’s African American Religious Affairs department spoke about the role of the religious vote and what People for the American Way is currently doing around judicial nominations.

Other panelists included: Nancy Zirkin from the Leadership Conference on civil rights, Jim Wimkler from the general board of the United Methodist Church, Holly Hollman from the general counsel of the Baptist joint committee, Sammie Moshenberg from the National Council of Jewish Women, Rick Foltin from the American Jewish Committee and Mark Pelavin from the Religious Action Center.

Panelists briefly discussed how their organizations reach various faith communities, and reiterated the importance of having strong judicial candidates for these lifetime position. Joi summarized the work that the African American Religious Affairs department is accomplishing with regards to judicial nominations.

The ministers programs were founded to act out of the prophetic vein of the Black Church. So I will say, that we do not claim to speak on behalf of the entire black church, because it is not a homogeneous group. We particularly advocate and represent the marginalized, disenfranchised, and outcast. So like the prophet Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., we advocate with a liberal reading of the Bible in one hand and the Constitution in the other. That’s what the prophetic black church has done throughout history. We rejected the “slaves obey your masters” rhetoric of the New Testament, while embracing the nation’s sacred documents that purport to stand for liberty and justice for all. And I want to underscore the word all. Because the truly prophetic black church is inclusive in its advocacy. That’s why MLK was an integrationist. That’s why as an organization we work on fair public education for all of our children, fair comprehensive immigration reform, and LGBT rights, because injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

Senator Inhofe announced earlier this week that he would filibuster the nomination of David Hamilton for a seat on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. And on the Senate floor he elaborated—he said this was because, in a case involving a ban on the Indiana House of Representatives’ use of opening prayers to advance a particular religion, Hamilton placed limits on prayers that used Christ’s name, but, according to Inhofe, said that invoking the name of “Allah” would be permissible.

There are two major problems with Senator Inhofe’s announcement.

First is the senator’s statement, back in 2005, that filibusters of judicial nominees were contrary to the Constitution. Of filibusters of judicial nominations he said: “I don’t think it should be used where it is contrary to the Constitution.” If you watched Rachel Maddow last night you go this point loud and clear. You can’t have it both ways – the Constitution didn’t change between 2005 and 2009; what changed is the President making the nominations.

The second is the Senator’s gross misreading of Hamilton’s opinion. As noted in an earlier post, Hamilton never ruled that prayers to Christ were impermissible, while Muslim prayers were permissible. What he said was that any prayers that advanced a particular religion were impermissible and that on the record before the court, the official prayers being offered in the Indiana House “repeatedly and consistently” advanced the Christian belief in the divinity of Jesus, but that the single instance of a Muslim imam offering a prayer was not distinctly Muslim in its content.

In a ruling on a post judgment motion, Hamilton did say that prayers to “Allah” would be permissible, but what Senator Inhofe’s statement leaves out is both the context and the full content of the statement. Hamilton was asked in the post judgment motion to rule on whether a prayer can be addressed to “Allah.” Explaining that this is the Arabic word for “God” used in translations of Jewish and Christian scriptures, Hamilton ruled this permissible. He went on to say: “If those offering prayers in the Indiana House of Representatives choose to use the Arabic Allah, the Spanish Dios, the German Gott, the French Dieu, the Swedish Gud, the Greek Theos, the Hebrew Elohim, the Italian Dio, or any other language’s terms in addressing the God who is the focus of the non-sectarian prayers contemplated in Marsh v. Chambers, the court sees little risk that the choice of language would advance a particular religion or disparage others.”

If Senator Inhofe would carefully review the record, either Judge Hamilton’s or his own, he’d see that his pledge to filibuster this nomination is a very poor idea.

I’m just back from the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on the nomination of Judge David Hamilton to the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, which the Republicans on the committee boycotted because they claimed they had not been given sufficient time to prepare for the hearing. In an ironic twist, the hearing was held in a small room off of the Senate floor—the same room that Senator Leahy, the Chair of the Committee, used to continue holding hearings on President Bush’s judicial nominations in the immediate aftermath of September 11th.

As Senator Leahy noted today, the Democrats on the Committee have a better record of pushing through Republican judicial nominees than the Republicans had when they were in charge. Yet today, the Republicans once again were all about trying to delay the process, and we’re now even seeing complaints that the hearing was moved to the Capitol, a move which actually helped accommodate Senators who needed to be on the floor to vote on budget amendments.

In the absence of the Republicans, Senator Leahy ended up asking Judge Hamilton about cases that Senator Specter had identified as potentially problematic – in other words he asked the Republicans questions for them!

David Hamilton is eminently qualified to sit on the Seventh Circuit. We hope the Committee will move his nomination forward when the Senate returns from its upcoming two-week recess.