Estrada Nomination (pt.3)

Mr. President, Daniel Webster once said that "justice is the greatest interest of man on Earth." I cannot help but think of that phrase as I read from today's letter from President George W. Bush, which was previously admitted as part of the RECORD, when he says:

The Chief Justice warns that the high number of judicial vacancies, when combined with the ever-increasing caseloads, leads to crowded courts and threatens the administration of justice.

It has also long been recognized that "justice delayed is justice denied," and that is exactly what is happening to American citizens throughout this country, while President Bush's judicial nominees are being filibustered and slow boated. The President is being denied his prerogative of choosing his nominees for Federal benches subject to the advice and consent, the proper constitutional role of the Senate, being exercised.

I rise this morning with great concern about the state of our judicial confirmation process, something that Senator Specter and others have commented on. They have called for reform, for a fresh start, and I believe that is called for.

The Constitution makes clear that the President appoints judges with the advice and consent of the Senate. It has long been established, by constitutional text, by Senate tradition, and by Supreme Court precedent, that that means a majority of the Senate. But today, a bipartisan majority of the Senate is being denied the opportunity to vote on Miguel Estrada, by a minority that is intent on changing the rules, applying a double standard, and denying Miguel Estrada an up-or-down vote in this Chamber.

Somehow, this process has disintegrated to the point where a partisan minority of the Senate will not even allow a bipartisan majority to vote. This, of course, is not what the Constitution says or what the Founders had in mind. Our Founders never intended that the judicial confirmation process would become so poisonous as it has today.

This filibuster, this act of preventing a bipartisan majority from expressing its consent to Mr. Estrada's nomination, is, as we have heard, without precedent.

I could not help but think also about last year's debate over the confirmation of another nominee of President Bush, someone with whom I served on the Texas Supreme Court, and that is Justice Priscilla Owen, who will come up again this Thursday for another hearing in the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Some people during that process criticized the Texas system of electing judges, one that has been established in our constitution since Reconstruction and which also is replicated in the constitutions of other States.

Justice Owen has, as I have, long been an advocate for reforming the way in which Texas selects judges. But, Mr. President, whatever the problems the various States may have in their judicial selection systems, nothing—absolutely nothing—compares to how badly broken the system of judicial confirmation is here in Washington, DC.

In Texas, at least, the people are given a choice of judicial nominees and there is an opportunity for debate and discussion and, at long last, there is a vote. Whatever you can say about the process, we always get there. We always hold a vote.

Somehow we have lost our way in the Senate. When the President nominates individuals of high caliber to serve the American people through an appointment to the Federal bench, and bipartisan majorities of the Senate stand enthusiastically ready to confirm those individuals, the process of confirming these highly qualified nominees is simply obstructed.

As I say, I have long believed we need a fresh start, as articulated by others, to the judicial confirmation process, and the first step would be to bring this fine judicial nominee, Miguel Estrada, to a vote. It has already been too long. It is time to vote.

I yield the floor.