Free Republic

AP Senator Sam Brownback has put a hold on the White House's nomination of a prominent abortion-rights supporter to a diplomatic post. The Kansas Republican, a strong abortion opponent, says he has concerns about Julie Finley's nomination as ambassador to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. Brownback is chairman of the Helsinki Commission, an independent U.S. government agency that formulates policy for the diplomatic organization. Finley is a longtime Bush supporter and Republican fundraiser, and also a founding member of the WISH list, a political action committee that raises money for female Republican candidates who support abortion rights....

This isn't the first time we've written about a Senate tradition called the "hold," by which an individual Senator can delay indefinitely a Presidential nomination. It's an abuse of the Constitution's advice-and-consent power, and the Senate would be better off without it. This being a Republican administration, most of the current abusers are Democrats, who have announced holds on the head of the Food and Drug Administration, the Deputy Secretary of Interior, a Treasury Undersecretary and an Assistant Secretary of Defense, among other nominees. But sometimes Republicans get in on the bad behavior, and Kansas Senator Sam Brownback is now...

Sen. Sam Brownback (R-Kan.) has placed a "hold" on President Bush's nomination of Julie Finley as ambassador to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. Mrs. Finley is well qualified. She has been a strong and active advocate in Washington for the expansion of NATO, the integration of Turkey into the European Union and the spread of democracy to countries of the former Soviet Union. But on the grounds that Mrs. Finley is pro-choice on abortion, Senator Brownback has exercised the Senate's "Polish" procedure and figuratively cried "I oppose". One senator can hold up a nomination by just noting...