Why Do Today What Can Be Put Off for a Week?

Everything was in place Tuesday for the Senate Judiciary Committee's confirmation vote on Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor.

Senators faced one another across a square formation of tables draped in black felt. Their nameplates and water bottles were before them. The microphones were on, the media and public seating areas were near capacity, and the cameras were rolling.

All was according to plan, with one minor exception: The senators didn't vote.

"I have been advised by Senator Sessions that the Republicans wish to put over the nomination of Judge Sotomayor," Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) announced, using the parliamentary lingo for postponement.

At Leahy's elbow, Sen. Jeff Sessions (Ala.), the committee's ranking Republican and the only GOP senator in the room, smiled innocently. "Our side's tried to fulfill our responsibility without any unnecessary delay," he said. Why this particular delay was necessary, Sessions didn't explain before the meeting adjourned.

Total elapsed time: two minutes and 46 seconds, gavel to gavel. A grand total of 325 words were uttered. In the annals of congressional hearings, this one may have set a record for brevity. It also might have become a new standard for legislative efficiency -- if only the lawmakers had actually achieved something.

Instead, Republicans, badly outnumbered on the committee and in the Senate, forced a one-week wait simply because they could. Democrats held the meeting anyway -- then marched out to the cameras to express their profound displeasure at the minority.

It was, all in all, a grandly staged performance of pointlessness.

"I had hoped that we might be able to vote out Judge Sotomayor this morning," declared the chairman, standing in front of his posse. Emphasizing the words, as if daring the Republicans to block her, he vowed: "She will be on the Supreme Court when the Supreme Court comes back in September."

About this there has really never been a doubt. Sotomayor's confirmation was a statistical near-certainty from the start because of the Democrats' 60 votes in the Senate, and her drama-free confirmation hearings last week erased any remaining question. But the lack of suspense has not kept the lawmakers from their habitual squabbles. The bulk of Tuesday's nearly three-minute hearing was a playground-style argument between Leahy and Sessions about which party confirmed the other side's nominees faster.

"I hope that once she is passed out of this committee that there will be no delay on the floor," Leahy began, shortly after the opening gavel and not long before the closing gavel.

Responded Sessions: "The confirmation, if it occurs, will occur sooner even than John Roberts's."