MARGASAK: Democrats have short memory on judge nominees

OPINION/ANALYSIS:

Ten months into Barack Obama’s presidency, Democrats are accusing Republicans of creating “a dark mark on the Senate” by delaying confirmation of his federal court nominees.

The mark might not be as dark as Democrats make it seem.

Of the 27 judicial nominations Mr. Obama has made so far, all five brought up for votes in the Senate have won relatively quick confirmations, including new Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor.

So what is this “dark mark” that Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick J. Leahy, Vermont Democrat, talks about?

It’s primarily two federal judges - one from Indiana, the other Maryland - who’ve been waiting five months for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Nevada Democrat, to bring their nominations for appeals court promotions to the Senate floor.

Republicans contend that the nominees are activist judges, and Mr. Reid hasn’t forced the issue - although he said Wednesday that he might do so by Veterans Day for at least one of the nominees.

One other nominee has been waiting since Sept. 10. But seven others have been waiting from only one to five weeks. That’s not a long time for the Senate, which prides itself as a deliberative body, and Republicans say they’re ready to vote on most of them.

Democrats have a record of their own that is far from being a bright light. Just three years ago, they were blocking votes on some of President George W. Bush’s more conservative judicial nominees.

Several of Mr. Bush’s nominees waited for years - two years for eventual Supreme Court Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. when he was nominated for an appellate court post.

Priscilla Owen waited through four years of Democratic blocking tactics before she was confirmed for the New Orleans-based federal appeals court. Miguel Estrada withdrew his bid for an appellate seat after a Democratic filibuster lasting more than two years.

As an institution that lets the minority party use rules to block legislation and nominations, the Senate often acts as a filter for preventing the more politically strident bases of each party from tilting the judicial branch too much one way or the other.

Although moderate nominees win confirmation easily, both parties use what is essentially the same argument to block or at least delay action on others: The particular nominee would substitute his or her own liberal or conservative philosophy for the law and the Constitution.

“It would be wrong for us to be a rubber stamp for each nominee,” Sen. Jeff Sessions of Alabama, the senior Republican on the Judiciary Committee, said in a recent confirmation dustup in the Senate.

That sounds familiar.

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