Nominations

NOMINATIONS

Mr. McCONNELL. Will the Senator yield for a question?

Mr. HATCH. I am happy to yield without losing my right to the floor.

Mr. McCONNELL. I ask the chairman of the committee if he is aware of any time in which the Senate, having set a precedent, tended to unset it lately?

Mr. HATCH. I have no doubt that we have unset precedents in this body.

Mr. McCONNELL. My fear, I say to my friend from Utah, is that we crossed the Rubicon on the issue of filibustering judges.

Mr. HATCH. No question about that.

Mr. McCONNELL. I can recall as recently as the last year of the Clinton administration, the chairman of the Judiciary Committee and others and myself voting for cloture on judges that we personally opposed and subsequently did oppose, even though we knew there was a chance of killing them on filibuster. I think of Paez and I think of Berzon.

Does the chairman of the committee share my view that we may have gone so far now that this would be the pattern forever in the Senate, denying judges up-or-down votes because we find them unacceptably liberal or conservative or too steeped in personal beliefs that they are willing to express before the committee?

Mr. HATCH. I have no doubt, to answer the Senator's question, if we continue down this pathway we are going to devolve to where people with strongly held religious beliefs are not going to be able to serve in this country. That is what it comes down to. I have no doubt that if we continue to violate the Constitution by allowing filibusters against—under our advise and consent mandate in the Constitution, we are going to wind up with a mess on our hands that we will not be able to repair. So we have to get out of this. I call on our colleagues on the other side to get real here.

Mr. McCONNELL. Further, I inquire of the Senator from Utah, the chairman of the committee, whether he thinks it will now be routine for every nominee to be asked their personal beliefs on a whole range of issues, personal and religious beliefs on a whole range of issues, and be expected to answer those kinds of questions.

Mr. HATCH. I do not think we will go that far. At least while I am chairman of the committee we are not going to do that. I did ask him what his religion was, after all of these questions that were asked in a very extensive hearing where religion was put squarely in issue by the other side. I did ask him that because I wanted to establish that this had gone too far.

I don't intend to ever ask that question again. I don't think my colleagues will. The distinguished Senator from Vermont said he will never ask that question, and he criticized me for doing so. But I think it was highly justified under the circumstances, and I think we made a pretty good case tonight that it was justified, although I am sure some of my colleagues will take umbrage.

But let them take umbrage. People all over this country are starting to say there is litmus test arising. Certainly there are outside groups that are trying to smear our nominees—especially Attorney General Pryor, Judge Kuhl, and Mr. Holmes.

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I further ask the chairman of the committee. He may well have received—I know I did and other Members of the Senate did—a letter today from William Donohue, Ph.D., who is president of the Catholic League For Religious and Civil Rights. He said, among other things, in his letter:

SOME OF PRYOR'S CRITICS ARE THEMSELVES CATHOLIC AND THUS RESIST THE CONTENTION THAT IS BEING OPPOSED BECAUSE OF HIS RELIGION. BUT THEY DO SO BY FALSELY CLAIMING THAT ON THE SUBJECT OF ABORTION, THERE IS MORE THAN ONE ACCEPTABLE POSITION FOR CATHOLICS TO TAKE. THEY ARE DEAD WRONG. CATHOLIC TEACHING ON ABORTION IS UNEQUIVOCAL: IT IS GRAVELY SINFUL. THIS IS NOT A MATTER OF DISPUTE—IT IS A MATTER OF DOCTRINE THAT ALL CATHOLICS ARE EXPECTED TO UPHOLD. ESPECIALLY PUBLIC OFFICIALS.

THE DANGER, THEN, IS THAT BILL PRYOR MAY BE REJECTED BECAUSE OF HIS RELIGIOUS CONVICTIONS.

I think what is so disturbing here to many of us—I am personally not a Catholic—is that you could adhere to the teachings of your church and then in effect be penalized for it even though there is no evidence that in carrying out your duties as a public official you wouldn't follow the law.

I ask the chairman: Are we being penalized for our own personal religious convictions in seeking public positions?

Mr. HATCH. There are people all over this country who are coming to the conclusion that Bill Pryor is being treated that way. Personally, if you are going to apply abortion as a litmus test, and that is his deeply held personal belief, even though he has exhibited more than an effort to obey the laws no matter what they are, I can see why people arrived at that conclusion.

I see why Mr. Donohue feels that way. This is getting to be an avalanche. The new code words for some are that, well, I don't personally believe in abortion but I believe a woman ought to have a right to choose.

Give me a break. That is a nice excuse. But that certainly is not acceptable, it seems to me, to many religions, including the Catholic faith, as has been said by these letters.

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that this letter to which I referred from Dr. Donohue be printed in the RECORD.

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I ask the chairman of the committee, isn't the important thing whether there is demonstrable evidence that a nominee has been unwilling to follow established law and it is my understanding—I ask the chairman whether it is his understanding—that Attorney General Pryor has followed the law when it was very tough to do so as an elected official in Alabama.

I believe our friend from Alabama, the junior Senator from Alabama, Mr. Sessions, cited a number of cases upon which Attorney General Pryor, as an elected official and not insulated from the wishes of the voters, took very tough positions on various issues because he was following the law. Isn't that the fundamental question that we ought to ask of nominees, whether to the left or to the right? Will you follow the law? And if they have demonstrated examples where they have done so, that would be relevant to whether or not they ought to be confirmed.