For weeks, Republican Senate leaders have refused to act on President Barack Obama’s nomination of Judge Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court. If you won’t even allow a vote for Judge Garland, why should anyone vote for you? And won’t Democrats be inclined to retaliate when they regain control of the Senate by refusing to consider a Republican president’s judicial nominees? The text of the Constitution thus leaves the Senate free to exercise that power however it sees fit. Grassley was responding to a Des Moines Register editorial calling Republicans’ blockade “un-American” and specifically singling out Grassley, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, for blame. The president should advise the Senate that he will deem its failure to act by a specified reasonable date in the future to constitute a deliberate waiver of the right to give advice and consent.
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What or who caught the ire of the 82-year-old Republican from Iowa who serves as chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee?
According to a statement from his office, Republican Sen. If that’s the McConnell principle, vacancies that arise during the ever-expanding “political season” will now remain unfilled for years.
The sudden death of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia was a huge loss for the court and for America.
Here again, history is instructive: Twenty-three years ago, President Bill Clinton publicly described Ruth Bader Ginsberg, during her nomination to the Supreme Court, as a “moderate”, yet internal memos from his own administration acknowledged her “instinct for defending some rather extreme liberal views”. Durbin says denying Garland a hearing and a vote is unprecedented.
Roberts noted that the last three nominees – Alito, Sotomayor and Kagan, all of whom he called highly qualified – were confirmed on largely party-line votes. They emphasized “the need for the judicial system to function independently of partisan influences” and said Judge Garland has “sterling” credentials. Senate Republicans vowed beforehand to schedule no hearings or votes on the nomination until after the presidential election. Yes, that’s right-the Constitution be damned if Obama feels that the Senate is moving too slow on his nomination, he could fill the vacancy. Why?
“When President Barack Obama was re-elected in 2012 he was elected to a four-year term and during that four-year term he has the power to nominate people for the Supreme Court”, Miller said. The reason justices are given a lifetime appointment to the bench is not to follow the guidance of a Charles Grassley but to make choices unfettered by politics.
Keith Uhl, a former campaign aide and personal friend of the senator, even called on Grassley to fulfill his “obligation” to move forward with the nomination process.
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The fiction spread by congressional liberals and their allied special interest groups that the Court can not do its work has already been debunked by both liberal Justice Stephen Breyer and conservative Justice Samuel Alito, who’ve said the court’s work won’t be hindered or impeded by Scalia’s absence. Diaz said she thought it was a good way to remind patrons what their senator was up to in Washington.
