On February 13, 2016 news was broke to the world that Associate Justice on the Supreme Court  Antonin Scalia had died at a ranch in Shafter Texas. With the passing of Mr. Scalia leaves a vacancy on the Supreme Court, a vacancy that needs to be filled. The President has fulfilled his constitutional duty and nominated Chief Justice of the D.C. Court of Appeals, Merrick Garland to fill Justice Scalia’s seat. As dictated by the Constitution the nominee will now go to the Senate for confirmation hearings. What is to do be done when the Senators on the Judiciary Committee refuse to do their jobs and hold hearings on the nominee. Well, there is nothing we can do.

Right from the passing of Justice Scalia Senate Republicans have vowed to not hold any hearings concerning this new Supreme Court Justice appointment. They claim that it is to give the American People a voice on who they would like to replace Scalia when in truth it is so the Supreme Court will not sway to the left so they have a chance to appoint a conservative judge to overturn anti-conservative rulings such as the Same-Sex marriage ruling. Since President Obama nominated Mr. Garland the Senate has been at a stalemate. Mr. Garland has only met with One Senate Republican and that is Senator Mark Steven Kirk of Illinois. Thankfully, this has set a precedent for other Senators to follow suit.

It is unlikely that Merrick Garland will survive this very long and drawn out nominating and approving process and by survive I mean be approved to serve on the Supreme Court. Even if the Senators Break and hold the hearings it is unlikely that Justice Garland will be approved by a Republican controlled Senate. It's clear that he will will get the votes from the Democrats in the Senate but it is a Republican Controlled Senate. What the Republicans in the Senate fail to realize that even if they are able to stall the nomination of Justice Garland, a moderate judge, they will not be able to hold out 4 years if a Democrat is elected President which one most certainly will be if Donald Trump is the Republican Nominee. They must also take into account that it might not be a Republican controlled Senate after this next election. If that happens, then any Liberal Supreme Court Nominee that is appointed will be approved. The next President will get a rather large number of nominees seeing as the average age of retirement for a Supreme Court Justice is 79 and several Judges are reaching that age.

The question is, would it be easier for the Senate to approve One moderate nominee or at least three liberal nominees in the foreseeable future. They’ve got some “Hard Choices” to make.