district judge, eastern district missouri, and also timothy m. cain to be district judge, district of south carolina. both seats have been deemed to be judicial emergencies. with these votes, we have confirmed 36 article 3 judicial nominees during this congress. of these, 23 have been for such judicial emergency type districts. i am pleased that we continue to have great progress in lessening the burden of our overworked courts, particularly concentrating upon judicial emergencies. i'm somewhat surprised in the delay in bringing these votes that we're going to have today to the full senate. at the majority leader's request, senate republicans cleared these votes nearly two weeks ago with the anticipation that the senate would vote on these nominees last monday, september 12. so i hope everyone understands that these nominees could have been confirmed eight days ago. it was not the republicans then holding up these for the last eight days. as i noted, we continue to make great progress in proceeding to president obama's judicial nominees. these votes t