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Statements Of
Senator Patrick Leahy
On The Confirmations Of Two Circuit Court Nominees
[WASHINGTON (Fri., May 21) – U.S. Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) Friday
welcomed the confirmation of two more of President Bush’s Circuit
Court nominees as part of an agreement forged between the White House
and Senate Democrats on judicial nominees. The agreement, reached
earlier this week, broke the impasse on judicial nominees that had
emerged earlier this year after the President twice installed
controversial Circuit Court nominees to the federal bench, raising
objections from Democrats that the recess appointments of such
nominees -- who had been considered by the Senate but for whom the
Senate had withheld its consent -- was unprecedented and constituted
an abuse of presidential power. As part of the agreement, the White
House promised to desist from any further recess appointments of
judicial nominees, allowing the Senate to move forward on 25 of the
President’s nominees.
The votes, held Thursday, brought the total number of
Bush nominees confirmed to date to 176. Leahy’s statements follow on
the two confirmation votes.]
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Statement
Of Senator Patrick Leahy
On The Nomination Of Raymond Gruender
To The U.S. Court Of
Appeals For The Eighth Circuit
May 20, 2004
Earlier this week, we were able to obtain a firm commitment from the
White House that there would be no further judicial recess
appointments for the remainder of this presidential term. That
undertaking led immediately and directly to the Senate vitiating a
cloture vote and proceeding to confirm the nomination of Marcia Cooke
to the federal bench in Florida. Today we debate and
vote on the nomination of Raymond Gruender to the Eighth Circuit.
Thus, despite the pessimism expressed by some last week, I continued
working to conclude an arrangement between the White House and the
Senate that would allow additional progress on judicial
confirmations. Working with Senator Daschle, Senator Frist, Judge
Gonzales and the White House chief of staff Andy Card, we were able to
reach an agreement on Tuesday.
I again commend our two leaders. I have
been working with Senator Daschle for months, as well as with the
White House, to find a way out of the impasse in judicial
confirmations. Senator Frist and I have spoken at length about this,
and he has been working on that, too. I was delighted to see the
meeting that Senator Daschle, Senator Frist, and Mr. Card finally take
place this week. Most importantly, I was pleased that the White House
agreed to no more recess appointments of judges.
I think we've demonstrated
our good faith. In the 17 months that the Democrats were in charge of
the Senate, we confirmed 100 of President Bush's nominees to lifetime
positions on the federal bench. And the Republicans, during the 23
months that they have been in charge of the Senate, have now confirmed
another 74. With the consideration of the Gruender nomination today,
that total reaches 75.
This is the 75th
confirmation for 2003 and 2004, the 108th Congress. That
matches the total for the entire two-year 1995-1996 period in which
Republicans controlled the 104th Congress and exceeds the
total for the entire two-year 1999-2000 period in which Republicans
controlled the 106th Congress. Of course in those years
Senate Republicans were reviewing President Clinton’s judicial
nominees. Further, with 175 confirmations, we will have matched the
total confirmation for the most recent 4-year presidential term
1997-2000.
It is significant that
this is the first circuit court nomination the Senate will have
considered this presidential election year. The last time a President
ran for reelection was 1996. During that session, with the Republican
majority controlling the Senate agenda not a single circuit court
nominee was considered. Accordingly, when the Senate acts to confirm
the first circuit court nominee this year, we will have bested the
total for the entire 1996 session.
I am pleased that the
Senate has received assurances from the White House that the President
will not further abuse the recess appointment power by making recess
appointments during the remainder of his presidential term. It was
the White House’s refusal to reach a reasonable accommodation of the
concerns of many Senators about the unilateral approach of the
President’s recess appointments to the federal courts that complicated
our efforts to reach an agreement regarding votes on judicial nominees
over the past few months. That is demonstrated by the prompt vote and
confirmation of Judge Cooke Tuesday afternoon. I was pleased to be
able to help facilitate the end of that impasse.
And now we are set to vote on another candidate, the nomination of
Raymond Gruender to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit.
While some have mischaracterized the nominees included in this week’s
agreement as “noncontroversial,” they in fact include a number who
will require debate and they will each require a roll call vote.
Unfortunately, Mr. Gruender is another nominee whose record raises
concerns, just as have the records of far too many of President Bush’s
judicial nominees. Mr. Gruender, though only 40-years old, has been a
member of the Federalist Society since 1988 and has played a lead role
in many national Republican campaigns. For the past two years, Mr.
Gruender has served as the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of
Missouri. In this capacity he has been a vocal defender of Attorney
General John Ashcroft’s aggressive and controversial tactics.
He
has also been critical of a city that passed a resolution reaffirming
the importance of civil liberties in the fight against terrorism. He
claimed that the resolution, which aimed to protect freedom of speech,
assembly, privacy and due process, is “putting lives in jeopardy and
increasing the chances for terrorists to be successful.” Mr. Gruender
stood by these statements and his criticisms of the resolution at his
hearing.
Despite his activities applying the PATRIOT Act as a U.S. Attorney and
his public pronouncements about its provisions, Mr. Gruender stated in
his answers to my written questions that he has “not formed or
expressed any opinions with respect to the constitutionality of any
provisions of the PATRIOT Act” and would, if confirmed, protect each
citizen’s civil rights and civil liberties.
I
do hope that, if confirmed, Mr. Gruender will be a person of his
word. I hope he will be fair and open-minded and listen to all
arguments involved in such cases. I hope he would not seek to decide
cases in accordance with his partisan or personal beliefs rather than
in accordance with the law. I also must note that, while he was
candid about some of his activities, Mr. Gruender failed to directly
answer several questions that I asked him in writing after his
hearing, questions that would enable me to fully evaluate his
qualifications for a lifetime appointment on the federal bench.
Just as a nominee last year attempted to stonewall Committee Members
by not answering questions in a forthright manner, so Mr. Gruender
avoided answering some of my questions by claiming that he could not
express his views on the issues without a complete factual record and
the benefit of the “deliberative process.” For example, Mr. Gruender
refused to express his opinion about Congress’s power under the
Commerce Clause, Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment, or the 10th
or 11th Amendments. This is a timid, evasive and useless
response. And many other circuit court nominees of this President
have answered the same questions.
Mr. Gruender does, however, have the support of both of his home-state
Senators and has served both as prosecutor and a defense attorney.
I
am hopeful that he will be open-minded on the bench and will act as he
says he will, that he will follow the law and not seek out
opportunities to overturn precedent or decide cases in accord with his
political beliefs rather than his obligations as a judge. I also
sincerely hope that Mr. Gruender will treat all those who appear
before him with respect and courtesy and will not abuse the power and
trust of his position.
For the last three and one-half years, I have urged President Bush to
work with us. Our proceeding today on this nomination demonstrates
our going the extra mile.
I
would note that President Clinton’s nomination of Bonnie Campbell to
this court was blocked -- by a secret Republican hold -- from ever
getting Committee or Senate consideration. By contrast, the Senate
has already confirmed four of President Bush’s nominees to this
circuit: William Riley, Michael Melloy, and Lavenski Smith were
confirmed while Democrats held the majority, and, last year, Steven
Colloton was confirmed to this court as well. Mr. Gruender makes the
fifth.
With his confirmation, Republican appointees on the Eighth Circuit
Court of Appeals will outnumber Democratic appointees by four to one.
There will be eight active Republican-appointed judges and only two
active Democratic-appointed judges. And there is one more vacancy on
this court which President Bush intends to fill with another
conservative nominee.
I
would note for my friends on the either side of the aisle -- who
consistently rebuke the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals as being “too
liberal” because 60 percent of the judges are Democratic appointees --
that the scales are tipped much farther
the other way on the Eighth Circuit. With Democratic
cooperation in confirming five of President Bush’s nominees to the
Eighth Circuit, Republican appointees now occupy 80 percent of the
authorized seats on that court.
I
congratulate Mr. Gruender and his family on his confirmation today.
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Statement Of Senator
Patrick Leahy
The Nomination Of Franklin S. Van Antwerpen
To The Third Circuit Court Of Appeals
May 20, 2004
Today, in addition to voting on the nomination of Raymond Gruender, we
vote to confirm another circuit court nominee, Judge Franklin Van
Antwerpen to the United States Court of Appeals for the Third
Circuit. A federal District Court judge since he was appointed by
President Reagan in 1987, Judge Van Antwerpen comes to the Senate
floor strongly supported by the Senior Senator from
Pennsylvania, who I know is eager to see him confirmed.
Today’s confirmation will make the 76th judge confirmed
this year alone and the 176th judicial nominee to be
confirmed for this President. With 76 judicial confirmations in just
a little more than 16 months, the Senate has now confirmed more
federal judges than were confirmed during the two full years of 1995
and 1996, when Republicans first controlled the Senate and President
Clinton was in the White House. It also exceeds the two-year total
for the last two years of the Clinton Administration, when Republicans
held the Senate. In fact, with 176 total confirmations for President
Bush in just three and one-half years, the Senate has confirmed more
lifetime appointees for this president than were allowed to be
confirmed in President Clinton’s entire second term, the most recent
four-year presidential term. We have already surpassed the number of
judicial confirmations won by President Reagan in his entire first
term in office.
The confirmation of Judge Van Antwerpen also marks the second circuit
court nominee confirmed for President Bush this year, which is double
the number of circuit court nominees confirmed in all of 1996, the
last time a president was running for reelection and Republicans
refused to allow a single circuit court nominee of President Clinton
to be confirmed all year. Today we confirm the 32nd
circuit court nominee of President Bush, which is more circuit court
confirmations than in all four years of President Clinton’s first term
in the White House.
A
look at the federal judiciary in Pennsylvania
demonstrates yet again that President Bush’s nominees have been
treated far better than President Clinton’s and shows dramatically how
Democrats have worked in a bipartisan way to fill vacancies, despite
the fact that Republicans blocked more than 60 of President Clinton’s
judicial nominees.
With this confirmation, 16 of President Bush’s nominees to the federal
courts in Pennsylvania will have been confirmed, more
than for any other state except California.
With this confirmation, President Bush’s nominees will make up 16 of
the 41 active federal circuit and district court judges for
Pennsylvania – that is more than one-third of the Pennsylvania
federal bench. With the additional four Pennsylvania district court
nominees pending on the floor and likely to be confirmed soon, nearly
half of the district court seats in Pennsylvania will be held by
President Bush’s appointees. Republican appointees will outnumber
Democratic appointees by nearly two to one.
This is in sharp contrast to the way vacancies in
Pennsylvania were left unfilled during Republican control of the
Senate when President Clinton was in the White House. Although
Republicans now decry Democratic filibusters of a mere handful of the
most extreme nominees, Republicans denied votes to nine district and
one circuit court nominees of President Clinton in Pennsylvania
alone. Despite the efforts and diligence of the senior Senator from
Pennsylvania, Senator Specter, to secure the confirmation of all of
the judicial nominees from every part of his home state, there were 10
nominees by President Clinton to Pennsylvania vacancies who never got
a vote. Despite how well-qualified these nominees were, many of their
nominations sat pending before the Senate for more than a year without
being considered. Such obstruction provided President Bush with a
significant opportunity to shape the bench according to his partisan
and ideological goals.
Recent news articles in Pennsylvania have highlighted
the way that President Bush has been able to reshape the federal bench
in Pennsylvania. For example, the Philadelphia Inquirer, on November
27, 2003, said that the significant number of vacancies on the
Pennsylvania courts “present Republicans with an opportunity to shape
the judicial makeup of the court for years to come.”
Democratic support for the confirmation of Franklin Van Antwerpen is
yet another example of our extraordinary cooperation despite an
uncompromising White House and the record of how President Clinton’s
Pennsylvania nominees fared under Republican control in
the Senate. In contrast to many of President Bush’s nominees, Judge
Van Antwerpen comes to us with a distinguished and widely acclaimed
career on the bench – both on the State and federal levels. He was
rated unanimously well-qualified by the American Bar Association, and
has the respect of his peers on the bench and of the attorneys who
appear before him. He is the kind of nominee this President and my
Republican colleagues should be looking for as we fulfill our
constitutional duty of appointing members to the federal judiciary –
an independent branch of the government.
I
congratulate Judge Van Antwerpen and his family on his confirmation
today.
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