Judicial elections, democratic appointment (e.g., senate confirmation), and the Missouri Plan (a/k/a "merit selection")

Search This Blog

Tuesday, April 1, 2014

Individual Senators Can Block Confirmation of Federal Judicial Nominees

The New York Times editorializes against the blue slip, the practice by which individual senators can block confirmation of federal judicial nominees


Year-end analysis by Russell Wheeler of Brookings:  "Judiciary Committee chair Patrick Leahy rigorously honors a committee tradition of not processing nominees who are opposed by either home-state senator [blue slip].  It is thus pointless for the administration to send the Senate a nominee without those senators’ assurances they will not block the nomination." 

The NYTimes says of the blue slip: "It’s a form of senatorial courtesy that goes back to 1917 or so, giving senators an anti-democratic power never contemplated in the Constitution."

No comments:

Post a Comment