Political Quotes

“during the recess last week, I had the opportunity to meet with Judge Merrick Garland of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, President Obama's nominee to fill the existing vacancy of an Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. During our meeting, we discussed the role of the Supreme Court and protecting the civil rights of Americans. We discussed a number of national security challenges, including those relating to the detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. We discussed the Citizens United case and campaign finance law. We talked about the respect for each branch of government and our constitutional system of checks and balances. We spoke about the important role of precedent in our judicial decisions and the need to build consensus on decisions. We discussed the value of promoting pro bono work in the legal profession and the need to address the growing access-to-justice gap. I was pleased to hear that as an attorney at the Justice Department, Chief Justice Garland worked to clarify ethics rules to allow government lawyers to engage in additional pro bono work. What I was doing is what I hope every Member in the Senate will do, and that is finding out more about Judge Garland, his judicial philosophy, the way he has conducted his life, his respect for the Constitution and the precedents of the judicial branch of government, looking at current issues and seeing how Judge Garland views those current issues.…”