The Senate Judiciary Committee approved John Roberts for a full confirmation vote in the Senate next week. He's sure to pass muster there, and as always it'll be interesting to see how many Democratic votes he garners. He got the votes of Senators Leahy, Feingold and Kohl in the 13-5 approval.
Okay, get ready for a roadhouse brawl on number 2.
9/23/05 0630: Mary Katherine Hamm, writing at Wizbang, also thinks this is being set up for a major conflagration over nominee #2.
Most around here think the Democrats are trying to act reasonable in the Roberts process so that they get a pass on being completely unreasonable when Bush's second nominee comes to the plate. I think that's also what's going on with editorial pages all over the country endorsing Roberts, especially the LAT:
"It will be a damning indictment of petty partisanship in Washington if an overwhelming majority of the Senate does not vote to confirm John G. Roberts Jr. to be the next Chief Justice of the United States."
She also notes a pertinent point made by Paul at Power Line.
A majority of the Committee's Dems now has effectively endorsed the notion that it is proper for a Senator to vote against a supremely qualified conservative nominee, who receives top marks from the ABA and is backed by such liberal organs as the Washington Post and Los Angeles Times, unless the nominee promises to decide issues the way the Senator desires.
In other words, the Democrats are voting as if eminently, even flawlessly qualified conservatives do not merit a spot on the court unless they'll decide cases as a Ted Kennedy would. Right, that's a scary proposition.
I think a frank discussion of the alleged impropriety of politics and the constitution of the federal judiciary is long overdue. That politics shouldn't be part of the process is an axiom of our current politics (even if it's only given lip service at times), and axioms need to be scrutinized from time to time.
(spoken as an unabashed supporter of openly politicizing the process)
Posted by: jpe | Sep 23, 2005 at 10:36 AM
Scary but true!...
Posted by: Zsa Zsa | Sep 24, 2005 at 06:55 PM
JPE: You support politicizing the appointment of judges? I can't even begin to imagine why. We go through the agony of election campaigns to decide those issues - we don't need to fight them all over again every time a federal judge is appointed. Did you support such politicization when Bill Clinton was appointing judges?
Zsa Zsa: Glad to see you survived Rita! Hey, I live just north of Teddy and I'm scared all the time.
Posted by: Giacomo | Sep 24, 2005 at 07:18 PM
Judges & jurispridence already are political - politicizing the process would be simple recognition of that fact. And my support of this isn't opportunism - I firmly believe that the Constitution calls for a politicized process due to the fact that judges are appointed pursuant to a check-and-balance mechanism.
That said, there's merit to your counter that politicization is best avoided for national sanity. Neither outweighs the other; one balances the two against each other, and reasonable people can differ on which is more important.
Posted by: jpe | Sep 27, 2005 at 09:43 AM