The clearest evidence that Democrats believe they are about to lose control of the Senate in six weeks is Eric Holder’s sudden decision to leave office. “They are panicking and deciding they better get done what they can in case the Republicans take the Senate and control the entire legislative branch,” Washington attorney Cleta Mitchell told me.

If Democrats quickly push through confirmation of a Holder successor in a lame-duck session after the November election, they could avoid a protracted nomination battle that would cast light on a variety of Holder scandals, from the botched gunrunning operation known as Fast and Furious to Justice’s haphazard probe in IRS abuses.

Democratic senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont, the current chairman of the Judiciary Committee, made it clear on MSNBC that he wants senators to conduct a very swift confirmation. “I hope that they would be able to decide on a nomination soon,” he said. “Definitely we should have confirmation hearings as quickly as possible in the Senate.”

The Hill explains that “confirming an attorney general between Nov. 12, when Congress is scheduled to return, and the end of the year would leave scant time for lawmaker vetting of the president’s nominee.” Normally, just the collection and evaluation of personal financial records and background investigations of any nominee take weeks.

Republicans are livid at the thought of a lame-duck session in which as many as 15 departing senators would have a say in picking the most powerful law-enforcement official in the land and newly elected senators would be disenfranchised.

“Allowing Democratic senators, many of whom will likely have just been defeated at the polls, to confirm Holder’s successor would be an abuse of power that should not be countenanced,” GOP senator Ted Cruz of Texas said in a statement.

Republicans are well aware of just how brazen Obama can be when it comes to appointments. In 2012, he moved to seat three pro-union members of the National Labor Relations Board using recess appointments he claimed were legitimate because the Senate formally wasn’t in session. The Supreme Court unanimously voted against the legality of those appointments, but the process took some 18 months.

Following that power play, Democrats rammed through a rules change that ended the requirement that every nominee to a cabinet agency receive 60 votes, allowing an appointment to proceed with a simple majority vote. But Republicans would have some leverage with which to protest an AG nomination, including holding up votes, and should they be taking over Senate control, delaying consideration of other key Democratic appointees.