Roll Call reports (subscription required for link) that Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Patrick Leahy, calling for “fair treatment” of President Obama’s judicial nominees, “is pushing for the Senate to confirm nine judicial nominees that have been pending for weeks and even months.” In support of his contention that the delay is unwarranted, Leahy complains that Democrats “have had to waste weeks seeking time agreements in order to consider nominations that were then confirmed unanimously.”
Well, to understand what Senator Leahy has previously regarded as “fair treatment” of judicial nominees, let’s take a look at some of President Bush’s judicial nominees who were confirmed unanimously (or by voice vote) after much longer delays than mere weeks. This list is only from the 110th Congress (2007-2008), with the number of days running from first nomination to confirmation. (I’ve drawn my data from Tables 1 and 2 of a Congressional Research Service report titled “Nominations to Article III Lower Courts by President Bush During the 110th Congress,” dated May 6, 2009. I list the judges in the order in which they appear in those tables.)
Courts of Appeals
Thomas M. Hardiman 183 days
Debra A. Livingston 315 days
Raymond M. Kethledge 727 days
Jennifer W. Elrod 189 days
Catharina Haynes 268 days
John D. Tinder 154 days
District Courts
John P. Bailey 260 days
Valerie L. Baker 273 days
Vanessa L. Bryant 427 days
Nora B. Fischer 216 days
Gregory K. Frizzell 239 days
Philip S. Gutierrez 281 days
Marcia M. Howard 254 days
John A. Jarvey 253 days
Frederick J. Kapala 154 days
Sara E. Lioi 238 days
Roslynn R. Mauskopf 428 days
Liam O’Grady 341 days
Lawrence J. O’Neill 183 days
William L. Osteen, Jr. 346 days
Halil S. Ozerden 231 days
Martin K. Reidinger 346 days
Thomas D. Schroeder 441 days
Benjamin H. Settle 225 days
Joseph S. Van Bokkelen 170 days
Lisa G. Wood 232 days
Otis D.Wright II 191 days
George H. Wu 203 days
Timothy D. DeGiusti 169 days
Sharion Aycock 199 days
James R. Hall 388 days
Richard A. Jones 199 days
Robert J. Jonker 376 days
Paul L. Maloney 376 days
Janis L. Sammartino 175 days
Amul R. Thapar 203 days
Joseph N. Laplante 184 days
Stanley T. Anderson 217 days
John A. Mendez 217 days
Brian S. Miller 177 days
Mark S. Davis 208 days
David G. Kays 208 days
Stephen N. Limbaugh Jr. 187 days
G. Murray Snow 198 days
Glenn T. Suddaby 224 days
(I address here (in the third-to-last paragraph) the contorted contention that the time from committee vote to confirmation is somehow more relevant than the time from nomination to confirmation.)
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