Senate Confirms Elena Kagan To Supreme Court

The Senate today voted 63–37 to confirm Elena Kagan as the newest Associate Justice of the US Supreme Court, replacing Justice John Paul Stevens, who retired this summer.

Five Republicans broke with their colleagues to support Kagan. Senators Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe of Maine, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Judd Gregg of New Hampshire, and Richard Lugar of Indiana all voted in favor of Kagan.

Senator Ben Nelson of Nebraska was the only Democratic senator to vote against Kagan.

Last year the Senate confirmed President Barack Obama’s first Supreme Court nominee, Sonia Sotomayor, by a 68–31 vote.

In debate before the vote, Republican senators argued against Kagan’s confirmation, saying that she had political but not judicial experience. They also criticized her treatment of military recruiters as Dean of Harvard Law School and expressed concern with how she would rule on gun-rights and abortion cases.

Kagan should be sworn in in time for the Supreme Court’s first case of the 2010 term on October 4.