Nomination of Richard A. Griffin to be United States Circuit Judge for the Sixth Circuit

NOMINATION OF RICHARD A. GRIFFIN TO BE UNITED STATES CIRCUIT JUDGE FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT

NOMINATION OF DAVID W. MCKEAGUE TO BE UNITED STATES CIRCUIT JUDGE FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I rise in support of the nominations of David McKeague and Richard Griffin to the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals.

The Sixth Circuit covers thirty million people in Michigan, Ohio, Tennessee and my home State of Kentucky. For the last several years, the Sixth Circuit has been operating with at least one-fourth of its 16 seats empty. This 25 percent vacancy rate is the highest vacancy rate among Federal circuit courts. The Administrative Office of the Courts has declared all four of these empty seats to be ``judicial emergencies.''

Because of this high vacancy rate, the Sixth Circuit has been operating under a crushing caseload burden and has been the slowest circuit in the Nation. According to the AOC, last year--like the year before it--the Sixth Circuit was a full 60 percent behind the national average. In 2004, the national average for disposing of an appeal in the Federal circuit courts was 10.5 months. But in the Sixth Circuit, it took almost 17 months to decide an appeal. For your average litigant, that means in other circuits, if you file your appeal at the beginning of the year, you get your decision around Halloween. But in the Sixth Circuit, if you file your appeal at the same time, you get your decision after the following Memorial Day--over a half year later.

Mr. President, you know the old saying that ``justice delayed is justice denied.'' Well, the thirty million residents of the Sixth Circuit have been denied justice due to the continued obstruction of Michigan nominees by my Democrat colleagues. What is the reason for this sorry state of affairs? An intra-delegation spat in the Michigan delegation from years ago--when a quarter of the current Senate was not even here. Nor, I might add, was the current President around either. This dispute has dragged on year after year. I do not know who started it.

My colleagues from Michigan cite Clinton nominees to the Sixth Circuit who did not receive hearings. Other people note that our colleagues from Michigan do not have a monopoly on disappointment. They point to Michigan nominees from President George Herbert Walker Bush, such as Henry Saad and John Smietanka, who did not get hearings when Democrats controlled the Senate Judiciary Committee in the early 1990s.

Regardless of who started what and when, all the residents in the Sixth Circuit have been suffering from the refusal of our Democratic colleagues to allow these seats from Michigan to be filled. Moreover, this obstruction has been out of all proportion to any alleged grievance. Specifically, our colleagues had been blocking four circuit court nominees from Michigan, as well as three district court nominees from Michigan. But of these seven Michigan vacancies that the Democrats had been refusing to let the Senate fill, five of the seats were not even involved in this dispute. President Clinton never nominated anyone to the seat to which current nominee Henry Saad has been nominated. The seat to which current nominee David McKeague has been nominated did not even become vacant until the current Bush administration. And the three district court seats that are being blocked were not involved in the dispute either. So my friends from Michigan had been holding up one-fourth of an entire circuit in crisis, along with three district court seats, because of an internal dispute about two seats, the genesis of which occurred years ago.

What had my friends from Michigan been demanding in order to lift this blockade? They had wanted to pick circuit court appointments. Mr. President, let us get back to first principles. As much as they would like to, Democrat Senators do not get to pick circuit court judges in Republican administrations. For that matter, Republican Senators do not get to pick circuit court judges in Republican administrations.

Article II, section 2 of the Constitution clearly provides that the President, and the President alone, nominates judges. It then adds that the Senate is to provide its advice and consent to the nominations that the President has made. By tradition, the President may consult with Senators. But the tradition of ``consultation'' does not transform individual Senators into co-presidents. We have elections for that, and President Bush has won the last two.

Fortunately, it appears our friends from Michigan have reconsidered their position. As a result, two fine jurists, Judge Richard Griffin and Judge David McKeague, will get up or down votes, and will be confirmed to the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals. All residents of the Sixth Circuit will benefit from their service on that court. We should all be thankful for that.

http://thomas.loc.gov/