Elena Kagan is expected today to be confirmed as the Supreme Court 112th justice, and its third unmarried woman with no kids. It also means the beginning of sleepness nights for Sen. Jeff Sessions. Update: The Senate confirmed her in a 63-37 vote, with just five Republicans signing on board including Sen. Lindsey Graham; Sen. Scott Brown did not. Nebraska’s Sen. Ben Nelson was the only Democrat to vote against her.
confirmations
Elena Kagan: A Supreme Court ‘Go’ In the Senate (Update: She’s Confirmed)
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jason
Sandra Day O’Connor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg were both married (now both widowed). Be nice if Queerty got its facts straight (no pun intended) once in a while.
DR
I’m not sure how I feel about this. A big part of me believes that a Justice with limited real-world experience is not a good thing. She’s too entrenched in academia and government. Oh, and she’s a political cronie, including a friend/associate of Obama prior to her stint with this administration.
GayGOP
My congratulations to Justice Kagan. I agree with Senator Brown, however, that she lacked the necessary experience as a judge to be a Supreme Court Justice. Then again, of the current Justices, I think that only Justices Ginsburg, Breyer, Alito, and Sotomayor had sufficient experience to be Supreme Court Justices.
That being said, I may not agree with Justice Kagan on much, she is certainly smart enough to be on the Supreme Court, and I wish her all the best.
tjr101
This is welcome news. There are a lot of important cases heading to the supreme court in the coming years some of these cases Justice Kagan will have to recuse herself from. If she is half as good as the great liberal justice she is replacing I’ll be quite satisfied.
whatever
Judicial experience is really overrated for a SC justice. Earl Warren was a politician (CA gov), and it was under his court that the US saw the greatest expansion of civil rights.
reason
@DR: Academia is real world experience, she is interacting with young adults when there making some of the most important decisions in life. She is acutely aware of all the trials and tribulations that students go threw with finances, healthcare, stress, and just life in general. She also served as Dean which expounded her experience not only dealing with the professors but the business aspects of Harvard. I know some people think that the students are just in one large frat party, and the professor, deans, and others are just nose deep in books and experiments all day but that is not how it is. She also clerked at the court under Justice Marshall. Justices that just sat on the appellate court all their lives are the ones without “real world” experience. Working in government and academia is absolutely real world experience. She actually will be the only one in the Roberts Court that has not served as a judge, so she brings a diverse outlook with real world experience.
DR
@reason:
Having survived law school, no, academia is NOT the same as real-world practice experience. Her demeanor before the high court was argumentative to the point that Justice Kennedy had to remind her, on the record, to take a step back before she completely embarrassed herself. A majority of her time has been spend as a dean, not in the courtroom, not working with real cases, not working in front of real judges with real people.
The worst judges I’ve ever practiced in front of, and the worst profs I ever had, were the ones who had minimal litigation and real-life experience.
reason
@DR: I think the argument you are trying to make is that she doesn’t have enough trail experience, which is very different than how real world experience has been defined by Congress, White House, and everyone else. Fair enough lots of communication is lost in misunderstanding. I believe she will bring a new prospective to the court by having a different life path than all the other justices on the court. One of the reasons I feel that McCain and Sessions argument was weakened is because though she is a Harvard lawyer her career has been markedly different than the Harvard and Yale lawyers on the court. Your opinion differs and I respect that.
Bill Perdue
Another bigot panderer for the Supremes.
DR
@reason:
That would be the point I’m getting at, yes. I have to keep reminding myself that when I define my “real world” legal experience, I have to remember that my audience is not always other attorneys, but lay people. Thanks for the reminder.