More Provocation

Washington Post ^ | Saturday, February 21, 2004 | Washington Post Editorial

[ScuzzyTerminator]

More Provocation

Saturday, February 21, 2004; Page A18

THE NOMINATION of Alabama Attorney General William H. Pryor Jr. to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit was, from the beginning, a provocation on the part of the Bush administration. Yesterday Mr. Bush made that provocation all the more provocative by installing Mr. Pryor -- who has been held up by a Democratic filibuster -- by recess appointment. Mr. Pryor is the second judge the president has placed on the bench using this procedure, which allows the president to bypass Senate confirmation for appointments made on a temporary basis. The result is that Mr. Pryor will be a judge for now, but he will leave office unless both Mr. Bush and a filibuster-proof Republican Senate majority win election this year. In other words, his prospects of longer-term service on the bench will be bound up with the electoral fate of the Republican Party -- exactly the sort of political dependency from which judges are supposed to be insulated.

That may not bother Mr. Pryor, whose political view of the courts was the reason we opposed him to begin with. We have supported several of Mr. Bush's conservative nominees and urged fair treatment for all. But the opposition to Mr. Pryor's nomination was well justified by his repeated descriptions of courts and judging in overtly political terms. His willingness to accept a recess appointment only underscores his unfitness.

[GeronL]

It was the dem's and spineless GOP jellyfish who provoked this.

[Post Toasties]

Cry us a river, Lefties. This was a favorite Xlowntoon era tactic.

[Mike Darancette]

More Provocation

The President is doing his job even though the Senate is shirking their job of advise and consent.

[Jet Jaguar]

It's about time. He needs to get the rest in. When the dems start complaining, appoint Bork.

[FormerACLUmember]

Major Hypocrisy Alert: WaPo praised Clinton recess appointments.

[Consort]

The Democrat filibusters were the provocation — not the Recess Appointment. If Pryor were voted down by the full Senate and then Recess Appointed, that would have been a provocation. The Recess Appointment did what a full Senate vote would have done.

[cinnathepoet]

Mr. Bush is free to ask voters to elect Republican senators so that the filibuster ceases to be viable against his nominees.

How kind of the Post to give Pres. Bush this permission.

[edger]

I will be impressed when Bush makes a recess appointment of Robert Bork.

[Bobber58]

The result is that Mr. Pryor will be a judge for now, but he will leave office unless both Mr. Bush and a filibuster-proof Republican Senate majority win election this year. In other words, his prospects of longer-term service on the bench will be bound up with the electoral fate of the Republican Party -- exactly the sort of political dependency from which judges are supposed to be insulated.

If Demonrats lose more seats in the Senate and House "in spite of" these actions, the only question will be if Demonrats, in the face of electoral disapproval of their actions, will continue to engage in these unprecedented maneuvers to deny this President the oppourtunity to fulfill his constitutional requirements to fill judicial seats.

[Timesink]

The result is that Mr. Pryor will be a judge for now, but he will leave office unless both Mr. Bush and a filibuster-proof Republican Senate majority win election this year.

Why can't Bush just recess appoint him again next year?

[Jet Jaguar]

Good point.

[azcap]

Why can't Bush just recess appoint him again next year?

He could. There is no constitutional grounds to prevent it. If  a president chooses, he could fill the entire vacant judiciary with recess appointments every time the senate is not in session.

 

 

[Jim Robinson]

Don't you just love it!

[Jim Robinson]

Next year the Senate will have clear sailing. Vote 'em in!

[CurlyDave]

Question:

Even if we don't get to 60 senators in 2004, how many of the RATs left in the senate will be vulnerable enough in 2006 to back off on the filibuster BS?

If we gained even 3 or 4 seats, a few may look over their shoulders at the 2002 results and decide that a little more cooperation might be in order.

Maybe all we need is 56 or so to confirm these recess appointments in the next congress...

A second question:

What is the law on filibuster of confirmation of a recess appointment?

Since the guy is already a judge is he entitled to an up or down vote, or does the appointment just automatically expire?

[BushMeister]

No article or news story on these issues can be taken seriously unless past precedent regarding #s of recess appointed judges per president are given.

Additionally, if this judge cannot, as the WP claims, be "approved on the merits", then prove it in an up-or-down vote.

[nathanbedford]

I would have been more impressed had Bush done something, anything effective on behalf of his appointments, especially Estrada, at a time when it was not obvious to the whole world that his base desperately required shoring up.

As it appears now, the ploy looks more cynically directed against us than against the dems. Federal judicial appointments are for life, not one year. Bush should have fought the Estrada nomination out on the spanish radio stations and really taken the dems resistence to the whole people. Why was the leaked memo not exploited?

Does he really think our perceptions are so shallow and our libidos so excitable that he can make it ok for the base with this fandango?

There is no punch here because the bulk of the electorate has not had the reasons for the interim appointments properly explained. This is symptomatic of the entire campaign fiasco. The hapless state of the union speech; appearing before Russert unprepared for prime time when we all warned him against such a danger; The President's Report on Jobs followed by staff remarks that we really don't know what we are talking about when it comes to creating jobs; the utter failure to field surrogates to support administration and President.

The list I fear will only grow daily. This is all to reminescent of his father's floundering in '92.

[kcvl]

Topic: Federal Judicial Selection
Article Title: Avoiding the Senate
Publication: Washington Post
December 31, 2000

---

Editorial applauds President Clinton's recess appointment of Roger Gregory to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit (See Court Pester, December 28) as "a protest against the unfair confirmation system" for federal judicial nominees. It maintains that, while "both parties have done their share of damage to the process," "the terms of . . . a truce ought to be simple: We should begrudge no senator a vote against any judicial nominee, but nominees must be afforded hearings and votes within reasonable periods of time. No holds by often anonymous individual senators." It concludes: "the new president has pledged to change the tone in Washington. No aspect of the governmental process needs the help more than this broken system of naming and confirming judges."

[FormerACLUmember]

Good find- I forwarded this to Drudge and Newsmax.