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WASHINGTON—U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, made the following statement Thursday on the Senate floor regarding the growing obstruction against the President’s nominees. Seven days ago, the Democrat leadership of the Senate issued veiled threats to widen their years-long obstruction against the President’s judicial nominees to include the President’s nominees for federal agencies and cabinet positions. Those threats are now real:DEMOCRATIC LEADERSHIP'S OBSTRUCTION Mr. President, today is day 7 of the Democratic leadership's unprecedented obstruction of President Bush's nominees for various executive positions and judicial nominations. In fact, I have in my hand the Executive Calendar which reflects 46 of the President's nominees who stand ready to be confirmed by the Senate so they can get to work on behalf of the American people. But unfortunately, as appears to be a growing trend and one where our Democratic colleagues continue to dig in their heels, the answer to every entreaty we might offer, every suggestion we have in terms of creating jobs, in terms of putting people on the bench to decide cases that go unheard because judges are not being confirmed to these posts, we continue to get a consistent response on behalf of our Democratic colleagues of ‘no.’ the answer they give to jobs and manufacturing, medical liability reform, a national energy policy, workforce investment, judges, small business, class action reform, and faith-based and charities legislation is "no." Particularly on the judicial nominees, I point out, once again, that this obstructionism is unprecedented in the history of the Senate. Where we have a bipartisan majority in the Senate who stand ready to confirm highly qualified nominees, such as Justice Priscilla Owen of the Texas Supreme Court of my home State, people such as Janice Rogers Brown who serves on the California Supreme Court, or people such as Miguel Estrada who, after waiting for so long to have his confirmation heard on the Senate floor, finally had to give up and go about his daily life because of this unprecedented obstruction. the worst part of this is that it has not only been about blocking President Bush's highly qualified judicial nominees and other people who he has proposed for various boards and commissions serving the American people, this, unfortunately, has also involved a character assassination as well. Judicial nominees have been called names by Senators on the other side of the aisle that are really unbecoming of the dignity of this body, names such as "kooks," "Neanderthals," "turkeys," and other names that are just entirely inappropriate to the civil discourse and debate that people have come to expect and deserve a right to hear from Members of the Senate. we can disagree about policy matters. We can have a different proposal for the American people about which direction this country should go on a number of these issues. But surely -- surely -- the Senate should continue to conduct its discussions in a civil way and one that allows majorities to govern, not that allows obstinate minorities led by the Democratic leadership to block vote after vote on matters that are important to the people of the United States. the problem we now hear is they are objecting to proceeding on any nominees because President Bush has used the authority given to him under the Constitution to make recess appointments. They act as if this has never been heard of, that it is unprecedented in U.S. history. The fact is, there have been more than 300 recess appointments made during the course of this Nation's history, including by President Clinton, before President George W. Bush, and others. Indeed, this is a constitutional response to unconstitutional filibusters. Unfortunately, we know the nature of this process is such that if the Democrat obstructionists get away with blocking President Bush's nominees, not from voting against them but by preventing a vote on them at all, that this is a tactic once determined to be successful that will likely be employed by others when the shoe is on the other foot. When the next Democrat is President of the United States and Republicans are in the minority in the Senate, how is it we are going to explain to our Republican colleagues that, no, you should not use this tactic which, up until now, has been out of bounds but which has now been employed successfully against the Democratic minority against this President? we ask for an up-or-down vote today on President Bush's judicial nominees, and we would ask that rather than answering "stop" to all of the Republican agenda on behalf of the American people, that we could at least get an up-or-down vote. Sen. Cornyn chairs the subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights & Property Rights, and is the only former judge on the committee. He served previously as Texas Attorney General, Texas Supreme Court Justice, and Bexar County District Judge.