Political Quotes

“Mr. President, I join my colleagues who are expressing our frustration on the inability of the Senate to take up for confirmation judges who have been approved by the Judiciary Committee. You have heard our colleagues from Colorado, Minnesota and Rhode Island and there are many others who have come down and given similar circumstances about their judges being held up from a final vote. I know next week we will be considering the nomination of Elena Kagan to the Supreme Court of the United States and that will get a lot of attention and rightly so. It should get a lot of attention. Let me point out the facts. The Supreme Court will issue less than 100 opinions in a given year; whereas, our circuit courts of appeals will issue many more opinions that will have a direct impact on the lives of the people of this Nation. Most Americans who have contact with a court are going to have contact with the district court and the circuit court, where the cases are heard, where the juries are convened in trials. So there is a great interest in making sure we have confirmed judges for our intermediate appellate courts and our district courts. Here is the problem. The vacancies in these judgeships today are about 11 percent of the court. More than 1 out of every 10 judicial spots is vacant currently in the United States. My colleagues have told you about the backlog.…”