ConfirmThem

By DanCT Posted in Senate Rules — Comments () / Email this page » / Leave a comment »

GOP Senators made some great comments in the floor debate Wednesday, but you will find very little evidence of it in the MSM (e.g., headline at foxnews.com Wednesday evening: "Dems: 'Nuclear Option' An Abuse of Power"). A few highlights are discussed below.

Frist:

I have to believe the Senate will make the right choice. We will choose the Constitution over obstruction. We will choose principle over politics. We will choose votes over vacillation. And when we do, the Senate will be the better for it.

The Senate will be, as Daniel Webster once described it: “a body to which the country looks, with confidence, for wise, moderate, patriotic, and healing counsels.� To realize this vision, we don’t need to look as far back as the Age of Webster, Clay and Calhoun. All we must do is look at the recent past and take inspiration from the Era of Baker, Byrd and Dole. For 70 percent of the 20th century, the same party controlled the White House and the Senate. Yet no minority denied a judicial nominee with majority support an up-or-down vote on this floor.

Howard Baker’s Republican minority didn’t deny Democrat Jimmy Carter’s nominees.

Robert Byrd’s Democratic minority didn’t deny Republican Ronald Reagan’s nominees.

Bob Dole’s Republican minority didn’t deny Democrat Bill Clinton’s nominees.

These minorities showed restraint. They respected the appointments process. They practiced the fine, but fragile art of political civility. Sure they disagreed with the majority at times. But they nonetheless allowed up-or-down votes to occur.

Cornyn:

Richard Paez, a nominee of President Clinton, has been held up as perhaps one of the examples of our side treating a Democratic President's nominee unfairly. As this chart aptly demonstrates, if we would agree to treat Priscilla Owen exactly the way that Paez was treated, then Priscilla Owen would be sitting on the Fifth Circuit today, just as Judge Paez is now serving on the circuit court in the Federal judiciary. ...

The senior Senator from Vermont (Leahy-D), in 1998, said: "I have stated over and over on this floor that I would refuse to put an anonymous hold on any judge; that I would object and fight against any filibuster on a judge, whether it is somebody I opposed or supported; that I felt the Senate should do its duty." I could not agree more with those comments made in 1998 from the very same colleagues who today oppose the same principle they argued for a few short years ago....

[Justice Owen] was accused of ruling against injured workers, employment discrimination plaintiffs, and other sympathetic parties on a variety of occasions. Never mind the fact that good judges, such as Justice Owen, do their best to follow the law, regardless of which party will win and which party will lose. That is what good judges do....

Mr. President, the American people know judicial activism when they see it. They know a controversial ruling that is totally out of step with a judge's accepted role in our form of government when they see it, whether it be the redefinition of marriage, the expulsion of the Pledge of Allegiance from our classrooms and other expressions of faith from the public square, the elimination of the three-strikes-and-you're-out law, and other penalties for convicted criminals, or the forced removal of military recruiters from college campuses. Justice Owen's rulings come nowhere near those examples of judicial activism that we would all recognize clearly and plainly. There is a world of difference between struggling to interpret the ambiguous expressions of a statute and refusing to obey a legislature's directives altogether, or substituting one's personal views or agenda for the words of a statute.

Allen:

Justice Owen's record in these cases is far from that of an activist. In fact, it demonstrates her judicial restraint and her understanding of the proper role of an appellate judge.

THAT is the primary reason that Democrats oppose her. She's conservative, which, ironically, is what anyone in their right mind would want in a federal judge--someone who defers to the elected branches to make policy and defers to trial courts in their findings of fact. Even PFAW agrees: "Owen has an extremely disturbing record of judicial activism on the Texas Supreme Court." Never mind that by "judicial activism" they apparently mean "she is so judicious that she doesn't do anythng to promote our favorite liberal policies", they still feel a need to mouth the words.

Allen (again):

In fact, [Justice Owen] is arguably one of the best nominees President Bush has nominated to the appellate court.

She is Supreme Court material, which is one reason why the Democrats have reserved so much venom for her. They view the Circuit Courts as stepping stones to the Supreme Court. Best to keep highly qualified conservatives as far away from SCOTUS as possible. That may well be what happened to Miguel Estrada as well.

Hutchison:

[Justice Owen] has sat quietly by as people who do not have the faintest idea what she is really like have vilified her, and distorted her opinions, and questioned her motives. I notice that many of my colleagues on the other side have declined all opportunities to meet with Priscilla Owen. They have refused to sit down with her, ask her questions, and see if she is the person that is portrayed in the propaganda being spewed out by various interest groups.

I find these comments to be the most depressing. They won't even meet with her!