[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 100 (Tuesday, July 9, 1996)]
[Senate]
[Page S7503]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          JUDICIAL NOMINATIONS

  Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, with regard to the judicial nominations, I 
have a unanimous-consent request I will propound. I am sure the 
distinguished Democratic leader would like to engage in a colloquy. 
Before I do that, I want to point out what has occurred with regard to 
these nominations.
  Some time ago, when I was still serving as majority whip, I did try 
to get a unanimous consent to move a block of four nominees to the 
Judiciary. Objection was heard on that on behalf of, I believe, the 
Senator from Montana, who had a judge that was not on the list, that he 
wanted to make sure was considered.
  Subsequent to that, I tried a second time to get those four cleared, 
and an objection was heard from the Senator from Montana because he 
still was not satisfied with the assurances with regard to his own 
judge for district court position in Montana. I assured him at the time 
we would continue to work to try to get clearance on that nominee, that 
there were some objections, some holds that had been lodged against 
that nominee, and therefore it could not be included in that group.
  Once I was elected majority leader, in fact, I did continue to work 
on those four and others. On the Friday before the Fourth of July 
recess, we were able to get, preliminarily, 10 judges cleared. There 
was some last-minute problem with one of those 10, so we still had a 
group of nine judges that we had cleared on this side of the aisle, 
but, again, there was an objection heard on the Democratic side of the 
aisle.
  In an abundance of good effort to try to see if we cannot move some 
of these nominations where there are not, and, in fact, should not be 
objections, I have decided now I will try to bring up a judge each day 
over the next several days to see if we cannot get them cleared. I 
think it is a legitimate way. I have tried to do them in a group of 
four. I have tried to do them in a group of nine. Now I will try to do 
them one-by-one. Some of these judges--three or four--are supported by 
Republicans. The others are Democratic nominees. I would go back and 
forth for a while. But, overall, there will be several more that are 
being actively supported by the Democrats than by the Republicans.

  Once again, I am trying to be fair in how we do that. My intent would 
be to begin today with the nominee from Missouri, and go then, on 
Wednesday, with a nominee from Louisiana, because this particular 
nominee is a person that serves in the court system--I guess she may be 
a supreme court judge in Louisiana--and there is a qualifying deadline 
between Wednesday and Friday of this week for her to either seek 
reelection or to know whether she is going to be confirmed by the 
Senate or not. I am trying to move forward in recognition of that 
particular problem that she has and within the timeframe. Then we would 
go down the line.
  I have submitted to the Democratic leader a list of nine judges that 
I would intend to do over this week and next week. And then beyond 
that, I would continue to work and see basically how things go. If we 
are getting some of these done, we will continue to try to do them. If 
we hear objections every day, I do not know what else to do. I have 
tried a group of four, a group of nine, and I am trying them one at a 
time. I feel like my hands would be clean, and I do not see how there 
could be objection to us not moving these judges.
  I wanted to lay that predicate and explain what is happening. Some 
feel that none of these judges should be confirmed. Others, including 
myself, feel like several of them have been pending for a good long 
while, and unless there is a serious problem with the education, or 
qualifications, or ethics, we ought to try to move them. That is what I 
have been working assiduously to do. I am not doing it just by picking 
a name out of the hat. I am carefully looking at the judges and finding 
out if there are any problems, and as we get them cleared we can move 
down the line. Then I will move to the next judge or judges to see if 
they are, in fact, qualified.
  There is no question that, philosophically, I have problems with a 
lot of them. I am not using that as a basis or a guide stick. I am 
trying to take them up in a logical order to try to get the calendar 
acted on in this regard.

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