[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 133 (Thursday, November 18, 2004)]
[Senate]
[Page S11464]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 CLOTURE VOTES FOR JUDICIAL NOMINATIONS

  Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, while Senator Dorgan is in the Chamber, he 
made reference to the fact there have been cloture votes required on 
judges throughout the years. I want to expand on the Record some of the 
names of judges where cloture votes were required, in fact, where 
cloture votes were not agreed to and led to their defeat in a number of 
instances: Justice Fortas in 1968; now Justice Bryer but then circuit 
court nominee Steven Bryer in 1980, with two cloture motions; Rosemary 
Barkett, to the Eleventh Circuit in 1994; Lee Sarokin in 1994, with a 
cloture motion required; Marsha Berzon in the year 2000; Richard Paez 
in the year 2000.

  Cloture is not a new phenomenon when it comes to the debate over 
judges. Yet we hear now that suddenly the requirement that there be a 
cloture vote is something that is new to this Senate. It is not. It has 
been historically used. It is appropriate, and it is rare.
  As Senator Dorgan pointed out, 93 percent of the judges who were 
nominated by President Bush were confirmed when there were votes that 
came to the floor of the Senate. Ninety-three percent of these judges 
were confirmed. And the comparison to that of the Clinton years, where 
so many judges could not even get a hearing, where there was a 
filibuster in the Judiciary Committee because of the refusal to grant 
judges a hearing, is quite a contrast. We do not hear much about that. 
Instead, hearing that the refusal to have an up-or-down vote and a 
requirement for cloture is somehow labeled obstructionism is altogether 
out of line, as far as I am concerned, and inaccurate historically, 
inappropriate, and needs to be contested.

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