look at the history of the filibuster, your assumptions are wrong.
Fortas was not a filibuster, he had no support and his candidacy for Supreme Justice was withdrawn promptly.
Never have qualified candidates who have been passed on with recommendation by the relevant committee been denied an up/down vote.
This act by the dhimmicrats is a barbarous mangling of the Constitution - clearly, the role of the senate is to Advice And Consent, and they express this via an Up/Down Vote.
We all know the left cannot legislate it's agenda, hence the travesty that is our judicial system these past 35 years. Not just RoeVWade, but a host of others. Do you know that in the recent Mass Courts ruling on Gay Marriage, that this collection of robed ones not only made law from the bench, but also had the audacity to order the Mass legislature to legislate accordingly, with a deadline of compliance to boot???!!!
Do you know that President Bush, shortly after taking office in 2001, presented several candidates some of which were (9 or 11, iirc) nomination hold-overs (2 of which were lib-democrats) fm the previous administration, and that the democrats (remember, Jeffords was independent and the pubbies had no majority then) quickly confirmed the lib candidates and proceeded to hold up the Republican candidates (one of which was Miguel Estrada)?
The dhimmi's have been successful in thier mangling - they reason that sooner or later the pendulum swings back towards them, and whatever prospective gains the current administration can be prevented from achieving just means they will install more leftist amoeba utopian oligarchs on the bench when it comes their turn.
This is outrageous, and you Sir, damned well Know This!
"Never have qualified candidates who have been passed on with recommendation by the relevant committee been denied an up/down vote."
True, though the Democrats point out (correctly, in this case) that Republicans kept Clinton nominees bottled up in committee. So those nominees never received an up-or-down vote, even though the Republicans avoided that vote through a means other than the filibuster. The Democrats' point that Republicans have not always been committed to the ideal of an up-or-down vote is therefore valid.
Now, this doesn't mean we shouldn't change the rules. I think we should. I think nominees ARE entitled to an up-or-down vote, now or at any other time. That, in my view, is the right interpretation of the "advice and consent" clause. Remember, that clause comes in the positive, not the negative: it doesn't exactly prohibit the filibuster on judges; rather, it suggests the need for a real vote.
As for Fortas, you are right that he never had majority support, but he was filibustered and never received an up-or-down vote. The difference is that Fortas probably would have lost such a vote, unlike the nominees that the Democrats are now blocking.
When the Judiciary Committee revealed that Fortas received a privately funded stipend, equivalent to 40 percent of his Court salary, to teach an American University summer course, Dirksen and others withdrew their support. Although the committee recommended confirmation, floor consideration sparked the first filibuster in Senate history on a Supreme Court nomination.
On October 1, 1968, the Senate failed to invoke cloture. Johnson then withdrew the nomination, privately observing that if he had another term, "the Fortas appointment would have been different."
As you can see, Fortas was recommended by the committee but failed to get an up or down vote.
I would also refer you to Cboldt's comments just above these posts. Cboldt is correct on his first two points. However his last point about a "duty" isn't there. If there is a duty, it is that the Senate should consider whether to exercise the power to ratify the treaty (as in Kyoto, it did not), trying the impeachment or even if it wants to have a full vote on judicial appointees. The Senate has the power and the Senate chooses whether or not to exercise that power. The rules of the Senate allow a filibuster to be clotured with 60 votes. Remember that at the time of Abe Fortas' nomination, it was 66 votes. The Senate changed the requirement, but did not abolish the filibuster for judicial nominees or any other issue. (Granted, the Fortas issue was not why the requirement was changed to 60.)
While I would also like to see these nominees confirmed by the full Senate, I don't advocate "throwing the baby out with the bathwater". This issue has cut both ways in the past as each party controlled the Senate. The filibuster served conservatives well during the Fortas nomination and it now serves the liberals. On the other hand, Republicans also have used their Senate privilege of placing a hold on Clinton nominees, again, something not specified in the constitution. So the issue has benefited and hurt both sides.
The only true and unarguable answer is to elect 60 GOP Senators.