Help Get a GOOD Judiciary Committee Chairman!
Suggested Action:
Please call your Republican senator(s) as soon as possible and urge them to block liberal Pennsylvania Senator Arlen Specter from becoming Chairman of the powerful and critical Senate Judiciary Committee in the next Congress starting in January. (Names and phone numbers for Republican Senators below) Time is short. The decision will be made in the very near future. We recommend calls rather than e-mails or faxes because calls have more impact. There is not enough time for letters.
Brief Explanation (More detailed explanation below)
The powerful Judicary Committee plays the key role in getting President Bush’s judicial nominees confirmed by the Senate. If we are going to stop activist judges from imposing their liberal agenda on us by jusdicial fiat, it is essential that good, conservative judges be appointed. President Bush has nominated this kind of individual and will continue to do so.
Senator Specter is next in line to chair the Judiciary Committee but he must first be approved by his Republican colleagues. The problem is that he has a liberal record and has made statements that raise serious concern that he would not be completely supportive of President Bush in this effort. He is pro-abortion, for example, and has warned President Bush not to send up nominees who oppose abortion. He also claims that President Bush was not given any kind of mandate in the election by the voters to carry out his campaign promises, including appointing conservative judges. Because President Bush may be able to appoint 2 or 3 Supreme Court Justices in the next four years, it is particularly vital that the Chairman of this key committee share his goals and objectives.
This is a critical time in our history. President Bush’s re election and the pick up of 4 seats in the Senate give us the rare opportunity to reform the federal judiciary. We simply cannot trust him to lead this critical committee at this time. His senate colleagues can choose someone else, but they will not do so unless they receive an outpouring of concern from their constituents.
What To Do
- Check the list below to see if either or both of your senators are Republicans. Only Republican senators will have any influence on the Judiciary Chairmanship.
- Call the Washington office of your senator(s) at the number
listed below. Identify yourself to the person who answers as
a constituent and give them your name and town. Tell them that
you want them to tell your senator that you want him or her
to support someone other than Arlen Specter to head the Judiciary
Committee. If you want, you can mention a couple of points about
his record or the fact that he cannot be trusted to fully support
President Bush as this critical time, but generally that will
not be necessary because they are getting hundreds calls and
everyone cites the same reasons.
If your senator's line is consistently busy, most senate offices will let you leave a voice message after office hours. This is almost as effective as speaking to a staff person. - No matter what state you live in, also call Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist at 202-224-3344 and express your concern to his staff as well. As the Majority Leader, it is important that he hear from concerned citizens all over the country since he probably has more influence on the decision of who will chair the committee than any other senator.
- Forward this alert on to others who might also call their senators to oppose Sen. Specter becoming chairman.
Senators and Phone Numbers by State
Judiciary Committee members are noted. It is useful to call even if your senator will not be retuning to the next Congress.
Alabama |
Alaska |
Arizona |
Colorado |
Georgia |
Idaho |
Illinois |
Indiana |
Iowa |
Kansas |
Kentucky |
Maine |
Minnesota |
Mississippi |
Missouri |
Montana |
Nebraska |
Nevada |
New Hampshire |
New Mexico |
North Carolina |
Ohio |
Oklahoma |
Oregon |
Pennsylvania |
Rhode Island |
South Carolina |
Tennessee |
Texas |
Utah |
Virginia |
Wyoming |
Background On This Problem
A liberal senator from Pennsylvania, Arlen Spector, is next in line to take over the Senate Judiciary Committee in January. The current Chairman, Utah Senator Orrin Hatch, must step down because the Republican Party has adopted a policy that limits their members from serving more than 8 years as a committee chairman. By tradition, the most senior senator on a committee serves as its chairman and Sen. Spector is the next in line.
The Judiciary Committee is a powerful committee and the Chairman becomes a very influential senator. He or she hires the committee staff, sets the hearing schedules, and manages bills and judicial nominations on the floor of the Senate among other important responsibilities.
One of the serious problems in this country, one that is undermining our democracy, is unelected activist judges legislating from the bench rather than merely interpret laws and the Constitution as our founding fathers intended. The Judiciary Committee and its Chairman play a pivotal roll in determining what kind of individuals are confirmed as federal judges by the Senate. This is particularly critical in filling vacancies on the U.S. Supreme Court and President Bush may be able to name as many as 3 or 4 Justices in the next four years. Since justices will likely serve for several generations, if we can get good people confirmed for these possible openings, we can protect marriage, family and traditional values for many years into the future.
Activist judges are the real reason we need a federal constitutional amendment to protect marriage. If the courts were limiting themselves to their proper role, the definition of marriage could safely be left to the states as it always has been. But given the trend over the past few decades of activist judges imposing their social agendas by judicial fiat, we need a federal amendment to prevent activist judges from decreeing a federal definition of marriage that will include same-sex couples and force that on all the states. The same-sex marriage issue is merely a symptom of this larger and more fundamental institutional problem being created by activist judges.
Part of President Bush’s mandate coming out of the last election is to appoint judges who will interpret the law as they should and not try to make law from the bench. But to fulfill this mandate the Senate must also do its part in confirming the president’s judicial nominees. This has been a real problem in the first four years of the Bush Administration because many Democrats and some liberal Republicans, even though they are a minority of all senators, have been able to use the Senate rules to block votes to confirm a number of Bush appointees. .
This is why there is a potentially serous problem if Sen. Spector were to become Chairman of Judiciary. He cannot be trusted to fully support the President. For example, the day after the election, he rejected the idea that President Bush received any kind of mandate from the voters. Then, though he now denies it was his intent, he warned the President not to send up any judicial nominees who might vote to limit abortion. When other Senate GOP leaders, particularly Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, took him to task over these statements he tried to back off, knowing that he could only become chairman of the committee if a majority of his Republican colleagues supported him.
The problem is that we cannot trust what he is saying now about pledging to support the President’s judicial nominees. He has a long and liberal record in the Senate. In 1988, for example, he voted against confirming Robert Bork to the Supreme Court. The fight over the Bork nomination was in reality a classic fight over whether the Supreme Court would return to its proper role in our system of governmental checks and balances. Sen. Spector is aggressively pro-abortion, to cite another example.
Most tellingly, Senator Spector is a strong advocate of treating the Constitution as a “living document,” one that can be interpreted differently as circumstances or conditions “require.” Activist judges and their supporters use this philosophy as their rationale for using their rulings to make law rather than interpreting the Constitution.
We are at a rare moment in history when President Bush can take steps to restore the proper balance between the three branches of the federal government. But it will take the cooperation of the Senate and particularly the Senate Judiciary Committee and the Chairman if he is going to be successful.
It is only a Senate tradition that the next most senior senator takes over the chairmanship of a committee. They also have to be approved by the colleagues in their own party. Senators are very reluctant to break with tradition and will not bypass Senator Spector and select another, more supportive senator, as chairman unless they get overwhelming pressure from their constituents.
That is why it is essential that they hear from as many of their constituents as possible who will express opposition to Sen. Spector taking over this critical committee.
Want to help even more?
Please forward this on to others who may be willing to help defend marriage and the family.
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United Families International PO Box 2630 Gilbert, AZ 85299-2630
Phone: (480) 632-5450 • FAX: (480) 892-4417