Souter Retiring Creates SCOTUS Vacancy

According to news reports late last week, Justice David Souter is retiring from the Supreme Court.

This is quite serendipitous, as just two days before, I completed work on a novel detailing a partisan over a Supreme Court vacancy, aptly named “Confirmation.” (Will be widely available in June 2009.)

Souter was a liberal Republican judge, and his replacement by Obama will likely be much the same – a liberal. So the Republicans aren’t up in arms over this vacancy yet, although much of that could change depending on the appointee. Speculation ranges from the first gay justice to the first Latina to picking a Canadian-born, Harvard-educated Governor (Granholm of Michigan) to add some “real world” policy expertise.

I’m not particularly interested in the parlor games of who gets nominated, so much as the reaction by the various interest groups and whether they will get riled up by the nominee’s positions on the hot-button issues (if known). It’ll also be interesting to see how crypto-segregationist Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama will handle his new role as top Republican on Judiciary after Specter’s defection.

This will be the marque event of the summer in Washington, to be sure.