Mr. President, next week, the Senate Judiciary Committee will be voting on the nomination of Elena Kagan to be the next Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. This vote in the Judiciary Committee follows 4 days of hearings on her nomination. As the Acting President pro tempore knows, she is currently the Solicitor General of the United States. We not only had 4 days of hearings, every member of the Judiciary Committee had ample opportunity to ask questions and get responses from Ms. Kagan. We heard from outside witnesses, some who were directly affected by decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States. We reviewed tens of thousands of pages of documents. I pointed out during these hearings why Americans should be so concerned about who the next Associate Justice of the Supreme Court will be because the decisions of the Supreme Court affect your life. If you work, if you are a woman, if you vote, if you care about the air you breathe or the water you drink, if you are a consumer, you need to be concerned about the Supreme Court of the United States. The Constitution protects us from the abuses of power, whether those powers are generated by government or powerful special interests. The Supreme Court was designed to be the protector of our constitutional rights.…
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