Republican Kirk breaks with US Senate leaders on high court seat

Stephen Breyer, Elena Kagan, Ruth Bader Ginsberg and Sonya Sotomayor have been classified as the liberal wing, and Scalia, Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Chief Justice John Roberts comprised the conservative wing.

The vice president added that his record chairing the Senate Judiciary Committee for eight years was “hard to beat”. A day earlier, as his casket lay in repose at the Supreme Court, arguments about filling his seat thundered across the city. Republicans have argued Obama, who will be out of office next January, should allow the next president to pick a nominee. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., is adamant that “this vacancy should not be filled until we have a new president”. The last four Supreme Court confirmations took an average of 75 days from nomination to confirmation, meaning that if President Obama nominates anyone in the next month, they could be confirmed well before the period that Biden was supposedly arguing should be off-limits for Supreme Court nominations.

The President has the authority to nominate Supreme Court justices under the US Constitution, but the Senate must approve any nominee.

“I fully expect and look forward to President Barack Obama advancing a nominee for the Senate to consider”, Kirk wrote in an op-ed in The Chicago Sun-Times.

Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, is leaving open the possibility of holding a hearing for President Barack Obama’s choice to fill a Supreme Court vacancy.

The Supreme Court is meeting for the first time since the death of Justice Antonin Scalia, as speculation grows over a potential successor.

Kirk said he recognized Obama’s right to make a nomination in part after having served as a 23-year veteran of the U.S. Navy Reserve and as a senator in taking an oath to uphold the constitution.

Obama is expected to announce his nomination in coming weeks.

“We’ll have more to say on this” after Tuesday’s Republican meeting, McConnell told reporters.

“But I believe that so long as the public continues to split its confidence between the branches [referring to the Republican White House vs. the Democrat-controlled Senate], compromise is the responsible course both for the White House and for the Senate”.

But some Democrats have their own concerns.

And the poll gives credence to those Republicans who are nervous because nixing Obama a chance to get a fair hearing from the Senate on his appointee could anger enough voters to flip the Senate to the Democrats.