legal scholar justin pedo recently cited chief justice william rhenquist regarding situations where the court of appeals had arrived at different conclusions about the resolution of legal issues. rhenquist said, and i quote, " "affirmants of each conflicting results would lay down one rule in athens and another in rome with a vengeance. over 30 constitutional law scholars recently echo that sentiment writing it and i quote, "a vacancy on the court for a year and a half likely would mean many instances where the court could not resolve a split among the circuits. there would be very -- a very undesirable result that the same federal law would differ in meaning in various parts of our country. and federal law is just that. it's federal. we cannot have one interpretation of federal law in michigan, ohio, and kentucky and a whole different interpretation of law in wisconsin, illinois, and indiana. previous presidents have weighed in on the importance of a fully operational court. president reagan, and i quote president reagan. he said every day that passes with a supreme court below full st

when the judiciary committee began its consideration of the elevation of justice rhenquist to be chief, here's what he said and i quote, "this committee has the obligation to build a record and to conduct the most indepth inquiry that we can." closed quote. let me repeat that. this committee, he's referring to the judiciary committee, has the obligation to build a record and conduct the most indepth inquiry that we can." closed quote again. now, senator grassley is interested in building a record. he refuses to meet with the nominee, even if the nominee is from iowa. he refuses to hold a hearing. he refuses of course to have a vote. he isn't interested in inquiries or building a record through his obstruction he's already choosing to close the door on a potential nominee. he's even said that he will not consider the nomination of his fellow iowan judge jane kelly, even though she was overwhelmingly elevated from the trial court to the appellate court in this body with, of course, grassley leading the charge on her behalf. so what he said about his fellow iowan jane kelly is a little st

rhenquist 89. do you notice that these are nominations by both democratic presidents and republican presidents and in each case the senate regardless of the party in control of the senate did their job? vetted these nominees, held a vote on them and proceeded. but now we have more than 317 days, 317 days still left in this administration and the leadership of this body is saying that they're not going to do their job for 317 days, not going to meet with a nominee, not going to hold a committee meeting on the nominee, not going to report that to the floor, not going to hold a floor debate, not because of the standards set up in the constitution, not because of the standard is this a fit character, is he or she fit by qualifications, and is he or she fit by judicial temperament. the standard of unfit character, no. this is a strike, a job strike based solely on partisan politic s. bringing partisan politics into the very place it should never be, confirmation of our judges. and not 100 days but more