|
|
"A comprehensive, collaborative elections resource."
|
Nuclear Whiner
|
|---|
| Parent(s) |
Issue
|
| Contributor | ArmyDem |
| Last Edited | ArmyDem Apr 19, 2005 04:28pm |
| Logged |
0
|
| Category | Commentary |
| News Date | Tuesday, April 19, 2005 10:00:00 PM UTC0:0 |
| Description | Bill Frist calls Democratic dissent on some judicial nominees "unprecedented." Look back a few years and you'll see that's simply not true.
By Herman Schwartz
Web Exclusive: 03.24.05
As part of their drive to overturn the welfare, regulatory, and social advances of the last 75 years, Republicans have sought to tilt the federal courts far to the right. As Ronald Reagan’s Attorney General Edwin Meese understood, stacking the courts could "institutionalize the Reagan revolution so that it can't be set aside no matter what happens in future presidential elections." If current Majority Leader Bill Frist's threats are to believed, the Republicans are about to endow themselves with an unprecedented power to complete this quest, removing via the "nuclear option" the Democratic minority's last resort in moderating their extremist judicial selections: the filibuster.
The Framers of the Constitution knew that they were creating a powerful, independent institution -- one tasked with checking the other two branches. To ensure that independence, the Framers designed a system that allows the president to nominate a judge, but subjects the nomination to approval by the Senate. With judges allowed life tenure and near-immunity from impeachment, the decision to confirm a federal judge is effectively irreversible and very long lasting. Today the average tenure of a federal judge is approximately 24 years, or six presidential terms; judges appointed in their 30s or 40s can serve for much longer. Mistakes or misjudgments about a nominee's fitness cannot be remedied; there can be no second thoughts.
[Snip]
Prior to 1996, when the Senate majority and the president were from opposing parties, senators usually deferred to the president with respect to lower-court judicial nominations. With the notable exceptions of the 1968 Fortas nomination and a failed Republican filibuster of H. Lee Sarokin in 1994, neither party filibustered the other's judicial nominations, and virtu |
| Share |
|
|
2¢
|
|
| Article | Read Full Article |
|
| Date |
Category |
Headline |
Article |
Contributor |
|
|
