Jeff Sessions

I think good judges can differ on whether they believe in a death penalty or not, and the critical thing is, I guess, will you follow the law.

I remain uneasy about some of the--not so much the answers you give, but how they square with what you've written before.

There's a danger of court take-over of the legislative process.

Judges cannot create welfare rights in the Constitution.

I think the nominee raises a lot of important philosophical questions about law and the Constitution.

I do think that's unfair to him. I think he's a mainstream justice.

You've written, arguing that the citizenship clause of the Fourteenth Amendment creates a positive right...

It seems to me that--well, I could see that that would be a theory. Is that the theory that Marshall and Brennan used when they consistently dissented in every death penalty case, asserting that the death penalty violates the Eighth…

Faithfulness is following it as written even if you don't like it.

If there are going to be welfare rights in society they must come from the legislature, they must come from Congress.

Professor Liu, your article I quoted earlier, 'Rethinking Constitutional Welfare Rights', is a troubling document to me.

There is no doubt Roberts had a brilliant legal mind, but a Supreme Court nominee must be evaluated on more than legal intellect.

Senator Burr also gave me that statement and did express his regret that he couldn't be here, but expressed his strong support for the nominee as a person that is scrupulously fair and has the intellect and integrity to be a fine judge.

Its mission is to promote, among other things, free enterprise, private ownership of property, and limited government. These are code words for an ideological agenda hostile to the environmental, workplace, and consumer protections.

The rule of law is--you interpret the statutes and Constitution as written

I love this Constitution, the great republic that we've been given. It is something that we should cherish and pass on to our children.

I would note that this nominee, Professor Liu, was set for a hearing in 28 days, when the average Court of Appeals nominee for the Obama administration so far was 48 days.

I would say that Judge Wilkins' leadership in establishing the sentencing guidelines was probably the greatest change in the entire criminal justice system since the founding of the Republic.

The courts have no role at all in questioning that judgment by Congress.

I think it is fair to say you would make some individual determinations on cases.

You take them into military custody, and then you can try them at your option in civilian courts.

We need a policy, No. 1.

I hope that you will review that, and I hope the New York case will be the beginning of a re-evaluation of that policy.

Well, so I would just say that there is not exactly a clean slate and you decide each case based on the facts of that case.

This is really significant, the whole thing is.