With Sonia Sotomayor's swearing-in as the 111th justice of the Supreme Court, the Ninth Justice blog is going dark, but its resources, news updates and analysis will live on in the archives. Visit some of the highlights below.
Analysis from Stuart Taylor Jr.
Video: Taylor Looks Back On Hearings
Before & After: David Souter And Sonia Sotomayor
Q&A: Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.
Q&A: Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.
Q&A: Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska
Q&A: Sen. Jeffrey Sessions, R-Ala.
Q&A: Former Sen. John Danforth, R-Mo.
Making The Grade: Experts Evaluate Hearing Performances
Sotomayor's Princeton Awakening
Book Excerpt: Advice & Consent by Lee Epstein and Joseph A. Segal
Book Excerpt: The Next Justice by Christopher Eisgruber
Sotomayor In Context: A Moderately Liberal Nominee
Sotomayor In Context: The Court's Conservative Bent
Sotomayor In Context: How Long A Ride?
Sotomayor In Context: Federal Bench Experience
Sotomayor In Context: Unprecedented Input From Interest Groups
(Credit: Paul J. Richards/AFP/Getty Images)
Judge Sonia Sotomayor is sworn in with the Judicial Oath in the East Conference room of the Supreme Court this morning by Chief Justice John Roberts as her mother Celina holds the Bible and her brother Juan Luis looks on.
President Obama said he was "very happy" with the 68-31 vote by which Sonia Sotomayor was confirmed, with nine Republicans breaking to join a unanimous Democrat conference -- minus the ailing Edward Kennedy, D-Mass. -- to support the nominee.
But according to a CNN/Opinion Research poll released Wednesday, only 27 percent of Republicans said the Senate should confirm Sotomayor while 58 percent opposed the nomination. And just 22.5 percent of Senate Republicans eventually voted to confirm her.
How bipartisan was the vote? A closer look at which senators voted yes or no reveals that most who are seeking re-election or election to another office voted against Sotomayor's nomination.
Of the GOP senators standing for re-election next year, all 12 voted against Sotomayor. Sens. Robert Bennett of Utah and John McCain of Arizona are facing primary challenges from conservative rivals. Although they have no declared challengers, Sens. Johnny Isakson of Georgia, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and David Vitter of Louisiana may wish to preemptively discourage any potential primary opponents.
Of the seven Republicans likely to retire between now and 2010, four voted yes -- Sens. Christopher (Kit) Bond of Missouri, Judd Gregg of New Hampshire, Mel Martínez of Florida and George Voinovich of Ohio. Voting no were retiring Sens. Sam Brownback of Kansas, Jim Bunning of Kentucky and Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas. Brownback and Hutchison intend to run for governor in their respective states.
In other words, four of the nine GOP senators who voted yes will be retiring in 2010.
Continue reading Parsing The GOP's Sotomayor Vote.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has used debate over Sonia Sotomayor to argue that Democratic opposition to Bush administration judicial nominees reduced the deference GOP senators are now obliged to give a president's judicial picks, freeing them to oppose nominees on philosophical grounds.
Asked after Sotomayor's confirmation Thursday if he felt his argument caught on with GOP colleagues, who voted 31-9 against Sotomayor's confirmation, McConnell said he was pleased with the way his caucus approached the vote.
"This was an issue upon which every senator tries establishing their own criteria for judging a nominee. And it's kind of shifted over the years from a period during which qualifications alone -- where'd you go to school, how long have you practiced and that sort of thing -- was viewed by the vast majority senators as the standard," McConnell said. "It led to nominees becoming something of a political football."
"I am proud of how the Republican conference handled this nomination respectfully, thoughtfully. I think we restored to some degree the reputation of the Senate in dealing with nominees, which had been significantly damaged, in my view, by the treatment of some of our nominees by the other side. Hopefully we'll continue to achieve a level of civility and respect in dealing with nominees in the future."
In the latest edition of Hotline TV, John Mercurio and Steve Shepard give their take on Sonia Sotomayor's confirmation and talk about who else came out on top.
• The Legal Times reports that Sonia Sotomayor was in New York "with more than a hundred colleagues and friends at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit when the Senate roll call put her over the top for confirmation as the next justice on the Supreme Court."
• USA Today rounds up jubilant reaction from Hispanics, including this moment: "At the moment of Sonia Sotomayor's confirmation as the first Hispanic on the Supreme Court, Carmen Garcia cried, hard."
• "Now comes the hard part," the New York Times reports in an analysis. "The volume and difficulty of the work, and the task of fitting into a storied institution populated by strong and idiosyncratic personalities, has unnerved even judges with distinguished records on lower courts, fancy credentials and ample self-confidence."
• Sotomayor's "background will probably affect her thinking and influence her decisions in ways that were hardly mentioned in the Senate fight," the Los Angeles Times reports as it outlines ways in which Sotomayor brings a unique perspective to the court. For example, "she will be the only justice whose first language is not English. She has had diabetes since childhood -- a medical condition classified as a disability under federal law. She was raised in a Bronx housing project where drugs were more common than Ivy League college success. And the 111th justice is a divorced woman with no children."
• NationalJournal.com compares Sotomayor to her predecessor, David Souter, and asks: "Is there any chance these two tight-lipped jurists could share a propensity for disappointing their supporters?"
Commentary
• The Washington Post cheers Sotomayor's confirmation but is left wondering "what kind of justice" she will be "now that the burdens of precedent are no longer absolute."
• The Wall Street Journal commends Republicans for a confirmation process that "was conducted respectfully and with a cool-tempered focus on her Constitutional philosophy," though it "can't help but contrast her treatment with the way Democrats smeared and filibustered appellate-court nominee Miguel Estrada in 2001."
Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., during the Sotomayor hearings. (Credit: Karen Bleier, AFP/Getty Images)
Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., was simply in the right spot at the right time. The most junior member of the Senate presided over the historic roll call vote of Sonia Sotomayor's confirmation Thursday because it was part of his regular rotation, which happens to be on Thursdays, said a spokesman for Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev.
"It was an honor," Franken said soon after the vote. "It was definitely an honor." Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., said that "he did a great job."
This was only the freshman's second time presiding over the chamber, according to Franken spokeswoman Jess McIntosh. While new senators get some run-throughs on the procedures, he did get plenty of help from the floor staff.
Franken lucked out on presiding over a historic vote -- both in substance but also in protocol. Apart from a few late-arrivers, all senators were seated at their desks as the roll call began, a rare occurrence that only happens for a handful of votes, including impeachment, high court nominations and other notable nominations such as that of Hillary Rodham Clinton for secretary of State.
So, what did Franken preside over his very first time? It was a debate on the highway trust fund extension, exactly one week ago.
(Credit:Alex Wong/Getty Images)
President Obama called Sonia Sotomayor's rise to the Supreme Court an "American journey" that shows the country is "breaking yet another barrier." He spoke to the media from the Diplomatic Reception Room following the confirmation vote, which he described as affirmation that Sotomayor has what it takes to serve as justice. Asked by a reporter whether he's happy with 68 "yea" votes, Obama answered: "I'm very happy."
His complete remarks are after the jump.
Continue reading Obama: U.S. Is 'Breaking Yet Another Barrier'.
Senate Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., reacts passionately to a question about President Obama's next Supreme Court nominee as Judiciary member Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., looks on. (Credit: Amy Harder)
The Senate had barely finished its roll call vote on Sonia Sotomayor's confirmation before reporters started asking about President Obama's next nominee to the Supreme Court. When Senate Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy was asked during a press conference whether he would advise Obama to nominate anyone he wants since Republicans have signaled they will vote against anyone he picks, the Vermont Democrat slammed his fists down on the podium in response.
"I would advise the president do exactly -- exactly -- what he did this time: Pick the most qualified person possible and nominate them," Leahy said in a press conference just minutes after the Senate voted 68-31 to confirm Sotomayor. "That's what he did, and that's what he will do with another vacancy." Leahy was accompanied by nine of his Democratic colleagues, including Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada.
The White House was a bit more restrained in its response. In the daily briefing today ahead of the vote, press secretary Robert Gibbs said that he didn't "have any news to report on what happens if there is another vacancy."
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., addresses a crowd assembled outside the Capitol Building Wednesday afternoon to rally for Sotomayor's confirmation. (Credit: Amy Harder)
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island was one of the few Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee whom liberal legal scholars said embraced a more progressive judicial philosophy during Sonia Sotomayor's confirmation hearings (subscription). NationalJournal.com's Amy Harder spoke with Whitehouse this morning about the larger battle between conservatives and liberals over the judiciary. Edited excerpts follow.
NJ: Why do you think it is important to embrace a philosophy that counters what the Republicans have put forth?
Whitehouse: I think the backdrop to the Sotomayor confirmation is a larger struggle over the direction and control of the American judiciary. Part of why this interests me is that I've been watching it for years. The Republicans have done this in relatively plain view. They've very clearly made it their express purpose to find and groom conservative judges and put them on the court for the -- again -- often express purpose of influencing decisions and changing the direction of the American judiciary. So, the sort of manipulative hand of the Republican Party in judicial nominations is almost uncontested at this point. They would phrase it in a different way but they'd admit that they're doing that.
That then takes you back to the contest over the Framing. And, I think that on that, they're just plain wrong and it's harmful to the judiciary and harmful to American democracy to let that theory [originalism], which is in many respects a cover story for the strategic plan to influence and ultimately control the judiciary, to gain headway. It's wrong both as history and as justice.
NJ: How do you think Democrats and Sotomayor herself did in countering the philosophy Republicans have embraced and laid out to the American people?
Whitehouse: I don't think that she did. Her job was to present herself as a mainstream judge and to avoid controversy. And, I think she was very successful at achieving those goals, which left it to others to make the larger point.
NJ: And, by others, do you mean...
Whitehouse: Us.
NJ: Did you and your Democratic colleagues do that?
Whitehouse: I think we did OK. We had two jobs to do. One was to try to help confirm Judge Sotomayor. And there's a tendency in support of that purpose to try to sort of lower the temperature in the proceedings, avoid disagreement and just get her through. The second is to try to make the larger point or rebut the Republican judicial theory that supports their efforts to appoint and control the judiciary. They're a little bit in conflict with each other.
Continue reading Whitehouse: SCOTUS Confirmation 'Most Political Thing In Washington'.
