Bush 'Disappointed' By Alito Date
President Bush says he's disappointed he won't get a new Supreme Court justice by Christmas as he wanted.
Senate confirmation hearings for Mr. Bush's Supreme Court nominee, Samuel Alito, are set to begin Jan. 9, with the intention of a final confirmation vote on Jan. 20. The president had called for a pre-Christmas confirmation for the conservative judge.
"I'm disappointed in the date but happy they do have a firm date for his confirmation hearing," Mr. Bush said Friday while in Mar del Plata, Argentina, for the 34-nation Summit of the Americas.
The president plugged Alito, whom he announced Monday as his pick to replace retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, a swing vote on contentious issues such as abortion and affirmative action. Alito is Mr. Bush's second nomine for the job; White House counsel Harriet Miers withdrew her nomination last week after withering criticism from conservatives.
"Sam Alito Jr. is an incredibly intelligent, well-qualified person who should be on the court," Mr. Bush said.
Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said after negotiations with Senate Democrats, that meeting the president's schedule request wasn't possible.
"It just couldn't be done," Specter said. "We have to do it right. We can't do it fast."
"We will be going on a very fast pace," said the committee's top Democrat, Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont. "But we're doing one that is reasonable."
Some conservatives are upset that Alito will have to wait until 2006 to get his vote in the Senate. They note there will be 81 days between the president's announcement of Alito's nomination and his scheduled confirmation vote.
"It appears that partisan stalling tactics have triumphed over a fair and timely confirmation process," said Tony Perkins, president of the conservative Family Research Council.
There were 73 days between Justice Stephen Breyer's nomination and confirmation in 1994; it took Ruth Bader Ginsburg 50 days in 1993.
Chief Justice John Roberts matched the 72-day nomination-to-confirmation average this year.
The White House says it is satisfied with the Alito schedule, which gives the federal judge a committee vote on Jan. 17 and full Senate debate the very next day.
Specter "conducted hearings that were fair and dignified for Chief Justice John Roberts," White House spokesman Stephen Schmidt said. "We're gratified that he's again leading this process in the Senate and are very pleased that there seems to be bipartisan momentum gathering for a vote on Jan. 20."
Some Democrats have raised the possibility of a filibuster — an attempt to prevent final action on the nomination — and Leahy stopped short of committing to a vote in the full Senate on Jan. 20.
Specter acknowledged that "lurking below the surface is a concern for a filibuster" and said pushing the start of hearings to January "takes away a principal argument for those who would say the Senate is rushing."
The date was announced as Alito, a judge on the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, courted Senate support in assembly-line fashion, using a room off the Senate floor as an impromptu office while lawmakers rotated through.
"He's the man!" Sen. Trent Lott, R-Miss., declared after his meeting with Alito.
Since Monday, Alito has met with almost two dozen senators as he works to build up the support that Miers didn't get before her withdrawal last week.
Conservatives complained that Miers, the White House counsel, did not have any experience as a judge and did not have a paper trail showing a conservative judicial philosophy.
Alito has compiled a voluminous record in his career as a judge, a U.S. attorney and government lawyer. The 55-year-old judge has written an estimated 300 rulings and participated in roughly 1,500 cases in 15 years on the bench.
In addition, the National Archives says its staff would need several weeks to complete a search of Justice Department records for any material pertaining to Alito. The agency also is seeking documents at the Ronald Reagan and George Bush presidential libraries that might shed light on Alito's actions or views, the statement said.
On Thursday, a group of centrist senators who halted a previous filibuster fight met to discuss plans for Alito, but at least two of the group's Republicans say their decision is already made: no filibuster.
"I don't believe that, with all sincerity, I could let that happen," Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said after meeting with Alito.
Graham and fellow Republican Mike DeWine of Ohio took their anti-filibuster message to the other members of the so-called Gang of 14. But the group's Democrats were urging them to withhold judgment for now.
"The truth of the matter is that it's way too early to talk about extraordinary circumstances," said Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Neb., a founding member of the group. "I'm not hearing any of my colleagues talk about it, and I'd rather not hear any of my colleagues on the other side talk about it as well."
Why is this casual grouping of senators so important to Alito's chances? It's a matter of mathematics, CBS News correspondent Dan Raviv reports. The only way the minority Democrats can prevent Alito from being confirmed would be to filibuster; and these 14 moderates – seven from each party – agreed filibusters would be used only in "extraordinary circumstances."
The defection of even two members of the group would virtually ensure that Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., would win a filibuster showdown.