10-25-01, On Capitol Hill today, a number of Senate Republicans are demoralized and pessimistic after the failure of their latest attempt to force the Democratic Senate leadership to speed up the confirmation of President Bush's judicial nominees.

For more than a week, Republicans held up consideration of a foreign-aid appropriations bill, trying to pressure Majority Leader Tom Daschle to abandon the Democrats' go-slow policy on judges. Daschle did not give in. Yesterday, with no success in sight, the GOP gave up. "The Republican caucus pretty much collapsed," says a senior aide.

But that wasn't the worst of it. Far more demoralizing was the hard line Daschle took with Bush Tuesday in a face-to-face White House meeting. The president was consulting with congressional leaders on a variety of topics, most of them related to terrorism, when he raised the issue of judges. The fact that Bush brought up the question at all is a measure of how important the issue is to the White House. By all accounts, Daschle stonewalled.

"He said Democrats don't need appropriations bills and don't need judges as much as the White House does," says a GOP staffer - and that was that. After the meeting, Daschle told reporters he told the president the Republicans' appropriations strategy simply would not work. "There is no connection [between the appropriations bills and judges]," he said. "I told that again to the president this morning....There isn't any leverage on appropriations bills."

So far, the Senate has confirmed 12 of Bush's judicial nominees. Now, after Daschle's statements, Republicans believe their best hope is to win about 20 confirmations by the end of the year. There remain about 110 vacancies on the federal bench, a significantly higher number than existed during the Clinton administration when Democrats accused Republicans of creating a "vacancy crisis."

If they ever had any hope that appeals to Democrats might succeed, Republicans on Capitol Hill and in the White House now realize that there simply is no bipartisanship when it comes to the issue of the federal courts and the president's responsibility to choose judges. There was no bipartisanship when Bush first arrived in Washington and tried to make friends with congressional leaders of both parties. And there is no bipartisanship in the post-September 11 world in which Republicans and Democrats are working together more closely on a variety of other issues.

Indeed, some key Democratic constituencies are arguing that it is more important now than ever before not to compromise on judges, no matter what temporary spirit of comity might prevail in Congress. One example of the depth of liberal feeling is contained in a report, "President Bush, the Senate and the Federal Judiciary: Unprecedented Situation Calls for Unprecedented Solution," issued October 17 by the left-wing advocacy group People for the American Way. The report says that in his "response to the aftermath of the September 11 terrorist attacks," Bush must decide whether he will "provoke intense partisan conflict" by "pushing for votes on predominantly right-wing ideologues" to the federal judiciary.