Posted on 09/22/2005 12:22:20 PM PDT by kellynla
The Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday approved John Roberts' nomination as the next Supreme Court chief justice, virtually assuring his confirmation by the Senate next week.
The official tally of 13-5 was anticlimatic, with the committee's 10 majority Republicans lined up solidly behind the conservative judge's nomination to the full Senate weeks in advance.
But the decision by three Democrats to join Republican efforts to make Roberts the nation's 109th Supreme Court justice outlined the division in the minority caucus over whether Democrats can, or should, mount even symbolic opposition to Roberts to send President Bush a message on his next Supreme Court nomination.
Five Democrats — Sens. Dianne Feinstein of California, Joseph Biden of Delaware, Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts, Charles Schumer of New York and Dick Durbin of Illinois — opposed Roberts in the final vote, and many of the arguments merged with senators' worries about the upcoming replacement for the retiring Sandra Day O'Connor.
Senate Judiciary chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa., told reporters after the vote he thinks Bush may name a replacement for O'Connor within days of the final vote on Roberts.
White House spokesman Scott McClellan commended the committee "for moving forward in a civil and dignified way," noting the White House hopes this sets an example for considering Bush's second nomination to the court.
Liberal groups that had opposed Roberts expressed disappointment with the committee vote, with Ralph Neas, president of People for the American Way, singling out Sen. Russ Feingold (news, bio, voting record), D-Wis.
He said the Wisconsin Democrat was the only member of his party on the committee who voted in favor of both John Ashcroft to become Bush's first attorney general and now Roberts. Neas said that Feingold's vote was a "tremendous mistake and a tremendous disappointment."
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
In retrospect, then, Bush should have left Roberts as the replacement to O'Connor, since his nomination was so hard to fight. He would have an easier time arguing that a conservative to replace Rehnquist was acceptable.
Now he has allowed them to argue that a conservative judge replacing O'Connor "moves the court to the right."
To argue thusly is to accept and enshrine bogus leftist cant. There is no precedent for any requirement that a nominee be ideologically similar to the departing justice, or that the existing "balance" of the court must be maintained. This is just leftist B.S. introduced at the present time because we have a President who has promised nominees more conservative than the current court. The "balance", such as it is, should result from the electorate electing successive Presidents based in part on their judicial philosophies. President Bush said what sort of jurists he would nominate, he was twice elected, so let's roll! Leftist propaganda should be scoffed at, rather than accomodated!
one down, but the search uh goes on
It's not bogus when our own elected R's cater to it. Whether or not I accept it, they do. As long as they're going to shrink away from "bad press," they should consider that when planning.
Trust me, Roberts will be the most conservative judge Bush puts on the court now that he has done this backwards.
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