Justice Kennedy: Speed Up the Judicial Confirmation Process

I spent the better half of the spring blogging in support of the Ninth Circuit nomination of one of my law professors, Goodwin Liu, so I have a pretty good idea about the deleterious effects of the Republicans' dilatory tactics on judges. But it's good to hear Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy pipe up on the topic, too.

Supreme Court Justice Anthony M. Kennedy has joined the list of legal leaders speaking out on the slow pace of judicial confirmations to the federal bench.

During the 2010 Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference, Kennedy questioned whether the Senate confirmation process is "working the way it should be," asking lawyers and law schools to study the process to identify "neutral" principles to guide both parties through the confirmation process, according to a release issued by the United States Courts for the Ninth Circuit.

"It's important for the public to understand that the excellence of the federal judiciary is at risk," Kennedy told the Los Angeles Times. "If judicial excellence is cast upon a sea of congressional indifference, the rule of law is imperiled."

Christopher Schroeder, who had to bide his own time before being confirmed as head of the Justice Departments's Office of Legal Policy (nearly a year, in fact), also pointed out at the conference that at the current rate nearly half of all federal judgeships would be vacant within the decade.

I am not so deluded to imagine that Kennedy's speech will cajole recalcitrant Republicans into ending their filibusters. The Senate GOP believes, rightly or wrongly, that they will pay no consequences for holding the judiciary hostage, assuming that voters won't punish them and either that the Democrats will give in the next time a Republican is in the White House or that the Democrats would filibuster in such a situation regardless of the tactics currently employed by the GOP. But it can't hurt to have one of the most prominent conservative jurists in the nation -- a Reagan appointee -- speak out on the need to move forward with staffing the federal bench.