Despite being the primary issue raised in opposition to his nomination, the Senate Judiciary Committee's confirmation hearing today yielded no exchanges on church-state issues with Judge David Hamilton (nor for that matter with the other appellate nominee in the hearing, Judge Andre Davis). Concern for Hamilton's legislative prayer decision has led at least one Senator to vow a filibuster, but the only Republican committee member to attend the hearing and ask questions, Senator Coburn (R-OK), engaged the 7th Circuit nominee on other topics.
Thomas Perez, however, the nominee to head the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department, was also heard in the same session, and did manage to eke out this mention (my rough transcript, from about 1 hour in):
SENATOR KAUFMANN (D-DE): What will your priorities be when you arrive in the new job if confirmed?
PEREZ:Well number one, as I have mentioned, would be depoliticizing the decision-making process and that includes again the hiring process . . . I also in terms of priorities would work hard to find out what's working. I think the work that has been done protecting religious freedom is a…good example of work that's been done well.
Committee members will be submitting additional questions for later response in writing. We can file this post under: I listened to the whole thing, so might as well tell you what I heard…
