Who are federal judges and what do they do?

Federal judges—the 900 men and women who sit on the U.S. District Courts, U.S. Court of Appeals and the U.S. Supreme Court—are appointed for life. They hear and decide cases involving crucially important rights and protections, and their decisions have a tremendous impact on our daily lives. For example:

• Federal appellate courts hear employer and union challenges to decisions by the National Labor Relations Board. Courts have the power to set aside union elections and unfair labor practice charges when they think the NLRB was wrong.
• Federal judges hear and decide whether workers are entitled to receive overtime pay from their employers under the Fair Labor Standards Act and whether they are entitled to take unpaid leave for a serious illness or for the birth or adoption of a child under the Family and Medical Leave Act.
• They hear cases involving race and sex discrimination in the workplace, including sexual harassment and racial harassment claims.
• They also hear challenges to Occupational Safety and Health Administration rules and citations, and have the power to overturn or strengthen safety and health rules adopted by OSHA, the Environmental Protection Agency and other federal agencies.

The decisions of federal judges have a direct impact on the lives of working people and their unions.

Why do I need to be concerned about the federal judiciary?

Americans expect and deserve a fair and balanced judiciary. But the Bush administration is claiming a mandate from the midterm elections and is preparing to pack the courts with extremist appointees with views outside the mainstream on issues of importance to working families—people like Texas Supreme Court Judge Priscilla Owen, who has a track record of making decisions hostile to workers and consumers, and federal Judge Charles Pickering, whose record as a judge in civil rights cases is troubling and who sought to reduce the sentence of a man convicted of burning a cross on an interracial couple's lawn.

If the Bush administration gets its way, the courts will be skewed for generations to come, putting crucially important rights and protections at risk. Almost all of the federal appellate courts—the most powerful courts in the country next to the U.S. Supreme Court—will be dominated by conservative appointees.

This is all the more outrageous because many of the seats Bush now wants to fill with ultraconservative appointees are only vacant because Senate Republicans blocked President Clinton's appointees to those very same seats. This includes three seats on the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which covers Michigan, Ohio, Kentucky and Tennessee; two seats on the 5th Circuit, which covers Texas, Mississippi and Louisiana; and two seats on the powerful District of Columbia Circuit, which hears the vast majority of employer challenges to the decisions of the NLRB. Republicans now are trying to take advantage of their own obstructionism and pack the courts with ultraconservative appointees.

What can I do to stop President Bush's court-packing plan?

Our government's system of checks and balances gives the U.S. Senate a crucially important role to play in the judicial appointments process. The Constitution gives the president the power to nominate judges, but judges only get confirmed if the Senate decides they are suitable for a lifetime appointment and votes to approve them.

The Senate is not a rubber stamp for the president's nominees-senators have a right and a duty to make an independent decision about whether a nominee deserves a lifetime appointment to the federal courts.

Your senators need to hear from you—and they need to hear from you now. Write and call your senators and urge them to reject the Bush administration's court-packing plan. Tell them we need and deserve balance on the federal courts, not courts packed with ultraconservative appointees who do not reflect mainstream America.