[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 64 (Monday, May 16, 2005)]
[House]
[Pages H3291-H3292]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           JUDICIAL NOMINEES

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Kuhl of New York). Under a previous 
order of the House, the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Franks) is 
recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. FRANKS of Arizona. Mr. Speaker, this is a critical time in the 
life of America. Our colleagues in the United States Senate are 
imminently approaching a crossroads that will forever impact the future 
of this Republic. They will choose the road that will restore the 
constitutional balance of power that our Founding Fathers so carefully 
constructed, or they will travel down that path that rewards a 
shameless behavior that has deliberately injured this delicate balance 
by transferring the executive power of judicial appointment to the 
legislative minority.
  The Constitution's advice and consent has been twisted into mockery 
by the Senate minority. Men and women of outstanding character have 
come forth as judicial nominees to be undeservedly maligned, smeared, 
ridiculed and then left in nominations limbo indefinitely by this 
unprecedented, unconstitutional and outrageous judicial filibuster.
  Mr. Speaker, this is a show of disregard and contempt for the world's 
flagship of freedom and toward her people and toward the time-honored 
principles of the United States Senate. We will recapture the civility 
that once presided over judicial appointments or we will forever 
surrender what Abraham Lincoln called ``the angels of our better 
nature'' to this bitterly partisan tactic that threatens the 
constitutional prerogative of the President of the United States to 
appoint good, decent and honorable men and women to the Federal 
judiciary.
  Advice and consent is clearly written in the United States 
Constitution. This judicial filibuster to prevent a fair up-or-down 
vote is neither advice nor consent and, Mr. Speaker, it is not in the 
United States Constitution. Never before 2003, in 214 years of U.S. 
Senate deliberations, has any judicial nomination supported by the 
majority of the Senate been denied a fair up-or-down vote. Yet the 
minority would have the public believe that the majority is the one 
trying to change the rules here, calling it the nuclear option. It is 
the Senate minority, Mr. Speaker, that has launched this unprecedented, 
quote, nuclear option by devastating the constitutionally required just 
consideration of judicial nominees duly appointed by the President of 
the United States.
  What the majority seeks is the constitutional option that is totally 
in keeping with 214 years of the rules, traditions and dignity of the 
United States Senate. Senate Democrats have strongly and arrogantly and 
openly

[[Page H3292]]

threatened to shut down the operations of the government if Republicans 
insist on the constitutional option. Mr. Speaker, I would suggest that 
it is far better to let the Democrats shut down this government 
temporarily than it is to allow them to shut down this Republic 
permanently.
  In this critical struggle for the future of this Republic, one of two 
things will occur. Either the time-honored and tested provision of 
advice and consent, written in the Constitution, will prevail or 
unprecedented judicial filibuster and obstructionism will take its 
place and become the tragic legacy of these days.
  Mr. Speaker, I should not have to remind my Republican colleagues 
that the people who have entrusted us with this majority have spoken 
with resounding voice on the issue of judicial nominations. They hear 
it and I hear it everywhere I go. The people of America have a profound 
sense of fair play and they are tired of some of their United States 
Senators cowering behind a distorted version of the true and impeccable 
auspices of the United States Senate. The people want their Senators to 
have the courage to take a stand on judicial nominations. The people 
want a fair up-or-down vote on judges, Mr. Speaker, and they will 
remember those who have the courage to do so and, sir, they will 
remember those who did not.
  The people understand how important this really is. They understand 
that it is truly about the Constitution itself, and they innately 
embrace the core message of those magnificent words by Daniel Webster 
when he said, ``Hold on, my friends, to the Constitution, and to the 
Republic for which it stands, for miracles do not cluster and what has 
happened once in 6,000 years may never happen again. So hold on to the 
Constitution, for if the American Constitution should fall, there will 
be anarchy throughout the world.''
  Mr. Speaker, the stakes could not be higher and this Republic truly 
hangs in the balance. We have a once in a lifetime opportunity to pass 
this miracle of the American constitutional Republic on to future 
generations that are yet to be. We owe it to the American people, we 
owe it to ourselves, we owe it to those future generations and we owe 
it to that vision of human freedom that our forefathers risked their 
lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor to entrust to us.
  Mr. Speaker, we must not fail.

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