Majority leader Bill Frist is scheduled to hold a senators-only conference call this afternoon to discuss the Supreme Court vacancy. One of the issues to be covered will be when to hold hearings on the nominee, assuming that President Bush chooses someone shortly after his return from the G-8 Summit. The Senate, which is now leaving for its July 4 recess, is scheduled to go on its August recess by the first week of August, and will not to return until September 6. “If we get a nominee delivered to us on July 11, when we get back [from the current break],” asks one Republican, “do we hold hearings in August? Do we gain anything by not waiting for two more weeks?”

So far, there is no consensus on the answer to that question. Right now, top Republicans in the Senate do not believe Democrats will filibuster a Supreme Court nominee — “They won’t filibuster,” one well-placed source said flatly yesterday — but the GOP leadership does believe Democrats will do everything in their power to drag out the confirmation process. Holding hearings in August would simply get the process going sooner rather than later. In any event, Republicans believe that the aftermath of the nuclear/constitutional/Byrd option fight has left the GOP, in the words of the well-placed source, “maximally positioned” to conduct a Supreme Court fight.