John Cornyn: “To repeat, Judge Roberts understands the proper role of an unelected Supreme Court Justice in a democratic Nation. Ours…”

“To repeat, Judge Roberts understands the proper role of an unelected Supreme Court Justice in a democratic Nation. Ours is not a nation where nine judges sit in a marble edifice and decide what is good for us. Nor is it a Nation conceived on the premise that these nine unelected judges should be primarily policymakers. Rather, our notion of justice and law is based on consent of the governed. You can read it in the Declaration of Independence. Obviously, were unelected, lifetime-tenured judges to depart from the text of the Constitution, depart from precedent, and get into a mode of sort of freewheeling ad hoc public policymakers, they would have departed in the extreme from the framework laid down by our Founders and from the framework ensconced in our Constitution. I will vote to confirm this nominee. I hope my colleagues will do likewise. I hope further that my colleagues, who have already stated their intention to filibuster the next nominee, will wait until the President has in fact named a nominee to succeed Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. It is just possible--it is just possible they will be surprised and they will find the President has, indeed, selected another nominee in the mold of John Roberts, who will be overwhelmingly confirmed as Chief Justice of the United States. I yield the floor. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Mississippi is recognized for 5 minutes.”