Senate

Today, the Senate confirmed Alison Nathan and Katherine Forrest to be judges on the Southern District of New York, and Susan Owens Hickey to the Western District of Arkansas. That brings the total number of female active district court judges to 183 – or 30%. In addition, Judge Nathan will become the third openly gay judge on the Southern District of New York. We heartily celebrate the addition of these highly qualified women to the federal bench. Read more »

About a year ago, Justice Scalia was asked whether the Fourteenth Amendment, which prohibits the government from denying the equal protection of the laws, applies to sex discrimination. (Hint: in decades of jurisprudence, the Supreme Court has said that it does.) His answer was shocking. He said:

“Certainly the Constitution does not require discrimination on the basis of sex. The only issue is whether it prohibits it. It doesn’t. Nobody ever thought that that’s what it meant. Nobody ever voted for that. If the current society wants to outlaw discrimination by sex, hey we have things called legislatures, and they enact things called laws.” Read more »

Yesterday, the Senate confirmed Jane Triche-Milazzo to the Eastern District of Louisiana. At this point, there are 231 women serving as active federal judges, which represents just under 30% of active judges on the federal bench. The Appellate Daily blog recently posted some nifty charts showing that although men make up 49% of the population, they represent 70% of the federal judiciary. In contrast, the representation of women and minorities on the federal bench is significantly lower than their representation in the population.  And unfortunately, some of these percentages haven’t budged for awhile. Read more »

The contrast couldn’t be more striking.

Today, the Senate is expected to address the most urgent deficit facing this country: the jobs deficit. Senators will vote tonight on the President’s plan to put people back to work and get the economy moving again. The plan would keep teachers and first responders on the job, invest in rebuilding our nation's infrastructure, provide job training, create incentives to hire the long-term unemployed, provide help for disadvantaged workers, extend emergency unemployment benefits, and prohibit discrimination against jobless workers.   Read more »

Yesterday, the Senate confirmed six judicial nominees, four of whom were women: Nannette Jolivette Brown to the Eastern District of Louisiana, Nancy Torresen to the District of Maine, Marina Garcia Marmolejo to the Southern District of Texas, and Jennifer Guerin Zipps to the District of Arizona. Not only did the confirmation of these women bring the total number of women confirmed to the federal bench during the Obama Administration to 50 (47% of all confirmed nominees), but two of these nominees broke glass ceilings in their jurisdictions – Judge Brown will be the first African-American woman on the Eastern District of Louisiana, and Judge Torreson will be the first woman to sit on the district court of Maine. Read more »

This time last month, the Senate was about to get back to work after Labor Day, and there were twenty judicial nominees ready for a vote. Clearing those twenty – some of whom had been waiting for Senate action for months – in the month of September seemed like a reasonable goal. The Senate is out of session for the remainder of this week, after it reached a compromise to keep the government funded, so we’re effectively at the end of September, as far as the Senate is concerned. So how’d the Senate do on judges? Read more »

Last night, the Senate confirmed Bernice Bouie Donald to a seat on the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals – adding diversity and excellence to that court. Judge Donald, who previously served as a federal district court judge in Tennessee, was confirmed by a vote of 96-2. She had the support of both home-state, Republican senators, and was voted out of the Judiciary Committee without opposition. Notwithstanding, her nomination did not receive a floor vote for four months because of the unprecedented obstruction of a minority of Senators. Read more »

This week, the Senate returns from its August recess. With all of the needs confronting the nation, it is unconscionable that because of a determined minority, included on its must-do list is a large number of unaddressedjudicial nominations that have been piling up. Despite 92 federal judicial vacancies, 37 of which are deemed judicial emergencies, the Senate left town without taking action on 20 judicial nominees, many of whom were approved without any opposition whatsoever by the Senate Judiciary Committee, and have been waiting for a Senate vote for months. Read more »

The following is a statement by Marcia D. Greenberger and Nancy Duff Campbell, Co-Presidents of the National Women’s Law Center, following the Senate’s vote not to invoke cloture and end debate on the nomination of Goodwin H. Liu to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.   Read more »

As the lame duck session of Congress draws to a close, it's essential that the Senate confirm Goodwin Liu to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Read more »