From the Associated Press:
Supporters and opponents of Elena Kagan painted vastly different
portraits of the Supreme Court nominee on Tuesday, as they got their
final say on the Senate floor before a near-certain vote to confirm her
later this week.
Democrats praised President Barack Obama’s nominee as a highly
qualified legal scholar who would add a sorely needed note of fairness
and commonsense to a court whose conservative majority, they argue, has
run amok. Republicans charged she’s an inexperienced cipher who would
use her post to mold the law to her own liberal beliefs.
Despite the partisan divide, Kagan was on track for easy
confirmation with the support of nearly all Democrats and a handful of
GOP senators. In line to become the court’s fourth woman, she’s not
expected to alter the ideological balance of the court in succeeding
retired Justice John Paul Stevens, a leader of its liberal wing.
“She made clear she’ll base her approach to deciding cases on the
law and the Constitution—not on politics, not on an ideological
agenda,” said Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., the chairman of the Judiciary
Committee.
He called her views “mainstream,” and said she has “demonstrated her
respect for the rule of law, her appreciation for the separation of
powers, and her understanding of the meaning of our Constitution.”
Sen. Jeff Sessions of Alabama, the panel’s ranking Republican,
presented a harsh indictment of Kagan, calling her an unqualified,
intellectually dishonest nominee who would pretend to be an objective
judge but instead seek to push her own agenda.
“I don’t think it’s a secret. I think this is pretty well known that
this is not a judge committed to restraint, (or) objectivity,” Sessions
said. Her past actions and testimony indicate she’d be “an activist,
liberal, progressive, politically minded judge who will not be happy
simply to decide cases but will seek to advance her causes under the
guise of judging.”
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