More Filibuster Nonsense

The blogosphere has been debating judicial nominations (kicked off with this Solum post---linking to the later posts), as the Senate continues its marathon debate.

From that debate comes the following interesting development. According to this Roll Call breaking news report (paid registration required), Senators Lindsey Graham and Saxby Chambliss "are filing a lawsuit against the Senate in an attempt to force the Supreme Court to overrule the use of a filibuster to block a president’s judicial nominations."

The article also provides the following information:

Graham and Chambliss had been considering the lawsuit option since late in the spring, but had been counseled by many constitutional lawyers that the courts would be loath to take up such a political issue that many consider an internal matter for one of the legislative bodies.

But Graham said some lawyers have encouraged him to take up the case, of which he and Chambliss expect to hammer out the final details over the Thanksgiving-to-Christmas holiday season. The actual suit is expected to be a direct appeal early next year to the Supreme Court, which could reject the case outright, refer it to one of the lower federal courts or take up the case.

Not only do I believe that there is virtually no chance that the Supreme Court would want to take the case, I cannot believe that the Republican Senate leadership would want the Supreme Court to take the case. After all, would the Senators want the Supreme Court or the Senate to be the ultimate arbiter of the Senate's own rules?

Posted by Rick Hasen at November 13, 2003 09:17 PM