Capitol Report
By State Representative, Leon D. Young
Leon D. Young
The sudden and untimely death of associate justice Antonin Scalia has thrown the United States Supreme Court into the gnarly undertow of partisan politics for all practical purposes.
Justice Scalia, who passed away last weekend while on a hunting trip in Texas, was the Conservative icon on the Court.
In the wake of his death, the Court’s ideological divide is now evenly split, between Conservative and Liberal minded justices.
Both Democrats and Republicans fully realize the significance of replacing Justice Scalia, which has prompted stark political lines to be drawn.
To illustrate this point, within hours of learning of his death, Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader, declared that the vacancy should not be filled until after President Obama leaves office.
While, on the other hand, the president has vowed to nominate a successor anyway.
This, in turn, has led multiple Republican senators to weigh in by saying that they strongly supported the position of Senator Mitch McConnell that the high court vacancy should not be filled until after the presidential election, denying Mr. Obama a chance to reconfigure the ideological makeup of the court in the last year of his second term.
In an effort to bolster their argument, some Republicans have invoked the Thurmond Rule.
The Thurmond Rule is a rule of thumb in the United States Senate that judicial nominees should not be confirmed in the months leading up to presidential elections.
The term originated with former Senator Strom Thurmond’s opposition to President Lyndon Johnson’s nomination of Justice Abe Fortas to be Chief Justice of the Supreme Court in June 1968.
In truth, strategists in both parties view the appointment process as a prime opportunity to galvanize the core supporters in the presidential and congressional elections.
With partisan preferences increasingly cemented in the American public and a declining share of swing voters, decisions are increasingly won through mobilizing party members rather than trying to persuade independent- minded or skeptical voters.
However, at the end of the day, the Constitution is quite clear: When there is a vacancy on the court, the president nominates someone for the court and the Senate either confirms or rejects.
Republicans should stop being obstructionists.