ConfirmThem

I managed to catch most of Specter's speech, which mainly contained the talking points the Republicans have followed for the last couple weeks in defending Southwick. He raised the broken assurances of Southwick's passage out of committee without directly calling Leahy a liar. But his closing, which should have been a call to "vote him out or else," was more of a wimpy warning against letting the Senate degenerate into the infighting that was characteristic of the confirmation battle of 2005. Was that supposed to be a veiled threat?

For the life of me, I can't figure out what Specter hopes to accomplish with that speech. Does he think Leahy and friends will listen to reason?

Judge Widener withdrew his provisional retirement and substituted an unconditional retirement, effective immediately. He will remain on senior status.

Chairman Leahy advised me that this nomination would go through the judiciary committee on a voice vote. Then when that effort was made, judge Feingold objected and any member of the judiciary committee has the right to hold over a nominee for one week. So it did not go through on a voice vote, notwithstanding the fact that Senator Leahy, the chairman, said that that was his plan. Senator McConnell has advised that the majority leader, Senator Reid, had said that the nomination would be confirmed before the -- before the Memorial Day recess, which is sometime ago now. So that this nomination was on the brink of confirmation by the chairman's statement that it would go through committee on a voice vote. He didn't expect someone to raise an objection. So he was powerless to move it on a voice vote at that time. But that was his expectation and mine. And then, as I say, the democratic leader, the majority leader, told the republican leader that (garbled) confirmation before the memorial -- there would be confirmation before the Memorial Day recess. Er now, it is my hope that we will not allow partisanship to once again grip this body.

We -- this senate, under republican control, wouldn't give hearings to President Clinton's nominees, and wouldn't give -- wouldn't bring them up for floor votes, and I objected to that, bucking my party and voting for Clinton nominees. We had protracted filibusters in 2005 and the threats of a constitutional or nuclear option.
I hope we don't go back to that. This body, as we all know, works on unanimous consent. Any senator can raise an objection to the reading of an amendment, a reading of the record, as we saw during the immigration senate, and tie up this senate endlessly, if somebody wants to impede the work of the senate. And it is my hope that we will not descend to that. We have very important matters to take up -- Iraq, the department of defense authorization bill, the override of the president's veto on stem cells, many appropriations bills.

Can't blame him.

I think that Specter is quite aware that his tenure as the ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee has always been contingent upon the beneficence of the conservative Republicans in the Senate. I bet he was beginning to hear criticisms of his role in the Dem obstruction of Southwick in the Republican caucus and decided to make a pre-emptive strike against those criticisms by meeting with some members of the conservative special-interest groups that he probably felt were influencing other Republicans to turn against him.

At the same time, I think he wanted to maintain cordial relations with Leahy and some other Dems in order to get stem cell research funded. The end result has been some meaningless chest beating to appease the conservatives but not offend the the Dems. I doubt seriously that Specter really wants to shut down the Senate. Why? Because the Dems apparently have wisely chosen to debate the popular topic of stem cell research next after the Iraq appropriations bill.

I can't find any confirmation of your news concerning Emory Widener on the internet. The change in his status is not yet reflected on the uscourts.gov vacancy websites:

http://www.uscourts.gov/cfapps/webnovada/CF_FB_301/index.cfm?fuseaction=...

http://www.uscourts.gov/cfapps/webnovada/CF_FB_301/index.cfm?fuseaction=...

Do you have a source?

As I understand it. Judge Widener has of yet not taken senior status. Rather, his taking senior status has been contingent upon the confirmation of his successor. Consequently, he cannot be REMAINING on senior status. Instead, he must've decided to immediately take senior status and not wait for the confirmation of his successor.

(Personally, I never understood Widener's contingent retirement requirement. It is as if he wanted the Dems to obstruct his successor. Any time a judge submits a conditional retirement letter, it reduces the need of senators to immediately confirm the judge's successor and allows them the luxury of a longer discussion on the merits of the successor.)

Let's just say I saw the letter. :)

As to "remain," I should have been more precise... I should have said, he will remain on the court, but in senior status (as opposed to completely retiring).

Regarding Judge Southwick, the main gripe seems to be the "N-Word" case. We've got links to it here.

It seems to me that not a single one of the judges at the Court of Appeals quoted the relevant statute, which was only quoted when the case ultimately reached the Mississippi Supreme Court:

"The employee appeals board may modify the action of the department, agency or institution but may not increase the severity of such action on the employee." Miss. Code Ann. 25-9-131(1)(1991)

Therefore I think the Mississippi Supreme Court was correct, and the Court of Appeals was incorrect. It would be very interesting to learn why not a single one of the judges at the Court of Appeals quoted the relevant statute.

My suspicion is that the parties in the case were both taking an all-or-nothing approach, and neither of them wanted to allow the possibility for a compromise solution: i.e. modifying the penalty downward.

This is one of the disadvantages of an adversary system. Only two extreme sides get argued, and the law sometimes gets defeated in the crossfire. It's hard to blame the judges for the failings of the attorneys --- especially the judges like Southwick who were not responsible for researching and writing the opinions.

I agree with your analysis above in the N-word case.
I also think that the role of the law clerk is to present a more objective analysis to the judge, especially because each party will tend to only argue an extreme view.
This is why good law clerks are so important, to sift through the fluff in arguments and identify the core issues at play in an appellate case.

it doesn't matter what the facts are, just what the KnownFacts™ are. In this case the KnownFact is that Southwick is a racist who condones use of the N-word. If you want to dispute that, then you must be a closet klansman too. Case closed. End of discussion. Next?