Editorial: Obama should appoint Scalia replacement

Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia passed away Saturday at the age of 79. 

Editorial Board
February 14, 2016

The upcoming presidential election places our country at a crossroads. Will our next leader be a Republican or a Democrat to pick up where Obama left off? Will the one elected be a traditional politician working his or her way up through the ranks or will he or she be an outsider?

We will see in about 10 months what direction our nation will take, but it seems right now that we have another decision to make. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia died Saturday night while on a hunting trip in Texas. The question is, does Obama replace him or does the country wait until the next president is in office to decide the nominee?

Less than 12 hours after the news broke that Scalia died, Republican senators across the nation began pushing hard to keep Obama from appointing a new justice. Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley said a new appointment should not be made until a new president is elected in November.

“It has been standard practice over the last nearly 80 years that Supreme Court nominees are not nominated and confirmed during a presidential election year,” Grassley told The Des Moines Register.

In response to this statement, a staffer at the Liberal Center for American Progress tweeted a list of the 17 nominations of a Supreme Court justice that have taken place during an election year.

That’s 17 times our nation’s leaders had foregone what Grassley called “standard practice” to keep the seats of the Supreme Court filled. Some would argue that most of these appointments were made at a time when our country was facing pressures that left a permanent impression on this nation. But that does not negate the fact that Grassley blanketed the last 80 years in his statement.

Other senators said holding off on a nomination would give the American people a chance to voice their opinions on who is selected because the president they elect would be the one to make the new appointment.

It is understandable that having a new voice molding the shape of the Supreme Court would be an enticing idea for Republican senators. However, the proponents of this idea seem to be forgetting that eight years ago, the American people made their voices heard by voting Obama to the presidency. By allowing Obama to select Scalia’s replacement, the American people would still have voices heard. 2016 is an election year, and the buzz of a new president is intoxicating, but that doesn’t negate what Obama has done for this country or the fact that he still represents the United States.

Obama will be the president of the United States for the next 10 months, and he has every right to select the next person to serve as a Supreme Court judge. It would be an injustice to the American people to leave a seat vacant for almost an entire year just to service someone who has yet to be selected for the toughest job in America.