US Senate to Vote Sotomayor Confirmation Today
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The full United States Senate will vote on the confirmation of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court. She would fill the vacant 9th spot on the Court and become the 3rd woman to serve, making two at present. Her nomination has been closely followed due to Republican opposition to some past policy statements and due to her possibility of becoming the first justice of Hispanic ethnicity in the Court’s long history. Democratic senators rallied behind the nominee in the days leading up to the vote, challenging Republican opponents, calling their opposition bias and suggesting they are ignoring her qualifications for partisan reasons.
Sen. Robert Menendez (D-NJ) put the challenge to Senate Republicans directly, saying: “To say you cannot vote for this qualified Latina sends a message to us, as a community, that we will not forget“. The message was clear: the Democratic party is ready to make the argument that Republicans opposed an eminently qualified judge of Hispanic ethnicity for simple partisan motivations, and they will want Hispanic voters to know about it and to remember it well. Supreme Court confirmation hearings have a way of turning into political precedent in the national psyche, and Democratic party strategists appear ready to make good on Menendez’ framing of the issue.
Already, Organizing for America and other Democratic groups are lobbying hard for public support in pushing senators to vote in favor, and they are seeking to make voters aware of those senators who oppose her and what their professed reasons are. The strategy shows a clear confidence that Judge Sotomayor is not only eminently qualified —Republican Lindsey Graham, of South Carolina joined her supporters in calling her the most experienced nominee in 100 years— but enjoys the backing of most Americans.
Observers have always suggested her confirmation would be relatively easy, with huge Democratic majorities, including the coveted “filibuster-proof” 60-40 margin in the Senate. But one after another moderate Republican has come forward declaring support, after Sen. Graham led the way with a statesmanlike speech about the obligation to honor elections and uphold the Constitutional system, which he felt Judge Sotomayor would serve well. Sen. Kit Bond (R-MO) is the latest to announce his support for Sotomayor in high profile fashion.
From the floor of the Senate chamber, Bond told colleagues:
There’s been no significant finding against her. There’s been no public uprising against her … I do not believe that the Constitution tells me that I should refuse to support her merely because I disagree with her on some cases. I will support her, I’ll be proud for her, the community she represents, and the American dream she shows is possible.
Sen. Judd Gregg (R-NH) also announced his support for Sotomayor, saying “Although Judge Sotomayor and I may not see eye-to-eye on all issues or share the same political ideologies, our democratic system should allow for such differences”. Gregg and Bond bring to 8 the number of Republicans who have openly expressed their intention to vote for confirmation. The others include Sen. Graham, as well as Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe of Maine, Indiana’s Richard Lugar, Florida’s Mel Martinez and Lamar Alexander, of Tennessee.
The positions taken by the moderate Republicans, highlighted by the vocabulary they chose to use in expressing their support, suggests Pres. Obama has actually moved the political debate more toward a post-partisan standard of public service, as he had said was his intention all along. Early attempts to work with Republicans faltered in the face of rigid, monolithic Republican opposition to that cooperation, and even now, Republican opponents of healthcare reform daily vilify the president as “socialist” and “anti-American”.
But the moderates have found a voice in speaking about Judge Sotomayor and the need to recognize that the rules and principles of the democratic system of American government should transcend party interest and elevate the work of Congress to a standard of longer vision than personal interest in the next election cycle. Their vocabulary gives the White House a template on which to base tough upcoming legislative negotiations, not only on healthcare reform but also on issues of campaign-finance reform and financial regulatory reform.
It is not clear whether Sotomayor will receive 68 votes to confirm, or a few more or a few less. In an unusual twist for a Supreme Court confirmation vote, the personal interests of politicians will not necessarily be served by an ideologically-driven vote. Sotomayor is seen by many legal scholars as one of the less ideological nominees in recent decades, and abortion —for instance— has been nearly absent from the debate. A vote against her could hurt any candidate who fails to make a convincing argument that she is biased due to her gender or ethnicity, a risky argument in itself.
In October 2008, projecting that Justice Souter might be one of the more likely to retire during Pres. Obama’s first term, this publication reported that Obama would be a better choice in terms of nominees to the Supreme Court for two main reasons: 1) because he promised not to use ideology as a litmus test, and 2) because the justices most likely to retire were all from the “liberal wing” of the Court, meaning a McCain victory would almost certainly push the Court out of the mainstream and further to the right than any elective branch of government.
That article noted that Obama “has said his standard for nominating judges would be to place judges on the Court who have devoted their careers to upholding the Constitutional rights of individual Americans, and who consistently apply the legal protections afforded by the Constitution, respecting and upholding the balance of power between the three independent branches of government.” Judge Sotomayor fits this description and brings an extensive judicial record that defies ideological pigeon-holing, as well as the kind of principled pragmatic approach to Constitutional law that Obama favors.
The Sotomayor confirmation process has, perhaps more than any single issue of systemic importance to American democracy, highlighted the emerging divide in Republican party politics, between the moderate pragmatists, interested in civic process and public service, and the ideological hardliners, who prefer to gamble political outcomes on the idea of uniform party unity. Having already forced out long-time Republican senator Arlen Specter, of Pennsylvania, the “purge” of which he complained may now be threatening to undermine ties between ideological conservatives like Jim DeMint and strong, principled moderates like Graham, Snowe and Lugar.
UPDATE, 12:31 EDT: Politico is reporting that Sen. George Voinovich (R-OH), who is not expected to run for re-election, has added his name to the list of Republicans who will vote to confirm Judge Sotomayor to the Supreme Court.
UPDATE, 18:11 EDT: Federal Appeals Court Judge Sonia Sotomayor was confirmed today by the US Senate as the 111th justice to sit on the US Supreme Court. She joins the 8 other justices currently in service to ensure a complete 9-member Court for the opening of the next session in October. Justice Sotomayor will be only the 3rd woman to hold a position on the Supreme Court and has made history as the 1st person of Hispanic ethnicity to win confirmation.
9 Republican senators joined with the Democratic majority to give Sotomayor a 68 to 31 margin of confirmation. The only senator not to cast a vote is Democratic Massachusetts senator Ted Kennedy, who is fighting a serious brain tumor and was unable to participate in the vote. Every other Democratic member (57) voted to confirm Judge Sotomayor, as did Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Joe Lieberman of Connecticut, the two independents who caucus with the Democratic majority.
She will be sworn in on Saturday. At 55 years of age, Sotomayor is the most recent young addition to the Court, a fact which means her presence may be intended by Pres. Obama to serve as counterbalance to the more conservative justices named by his predecessor. Because she is replacing one of the more “liberal” members of the Court, it is not expected that Justice Sotomayor will shift the ideological balance of power on the Court. [Complete confirmation update...]
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