Pray for confirmation of the following judicial nominees by the Senate this week: Amy Barrett; Joan Larsen; Allison Eid; and Stephanos Bibas.

Do not pervert justice; do not show partiality to the poor or favoritism to the great, but judge your neighbor fairly. (Lev 19:15)

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President Donald Trump is having more success getting judges confirmed than Democrat Barack Obama did at this early stage in their presidencies, and that disparity is expected to increase this week as the GOP-led Senate pushes through more of Trump’s choices.

Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has set the stage for votes on four of the president’s appellate court nominees and one district court nominee starting Monday night. In doing so, he declared that Democrats would be unsuccessful in stopping their confirmation.

“We’ll confirm all of them this week, no matter how long that takes,” McConnell said.

McConnell’s frustration stems from Democratic insistence on using all the time Senate rules allow for moving to an up-or-down vote on the nominee. It also ignores the many ways Republicans blocked Obama’s choices, most notably the Democratic president’s nomination of Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court. Republicans refused to even hold a hearing on Garland, insisting in February 2016 that the president chosen months later in November should fill the court vacancy.

Republican senators also blocked 18 Obama nominees by refusing to sign off on a so-called blue slip, thus signaling their opposition. Democrats became so frustrated with the use of the filibuster to block Obama’s court nominees that they voted in 2013 to lower the threshold for overcoming the filibuster from 60 votes to a simple majority. Republicans expanded the threshold covering district and appellate court judges to Supreme Court nominations earlier this year in response to Democratic opposition to Trump’s pick of Neil Gorsuch for the high court. . . .

Obama got off to a much slower start in nominating judges than Trump has. Obama had nominated one Supreme Court justice and 24 appellate and district court nominees at this stage compared to one Supreme Court justice and 57 appellate and district court nominees for Trump.

Still, conservatives have been frustrated with the pace in the Republican-controlled Senate and blamed McConnell. The Judicial Crisis Network threatened to run ads against McConnell but backed off after winning assurances from the Kentucky Republican that the pace will quicken.

More than legislation, filling lifetime posts on the courts is a presidential legacy that reverberates for decades. . . .

The Senate voted 84-10 Monday to confirm Trevor McFadden of Virginia to serve as a district court judge and then voted mostly along party lines to limit debate on the nomination of Barrett.

Conservative groups are pushing hard for Barrett’s confirmation, and criticized Democrats for questioning whether her Catholic beliefs would influence her legal decisions. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops said the challenge to Barrett was a painful reminder of a time when “anti-Catholic bigotry did distort our laws and civil order.”. . .

McConnell also moved to limit debate on Michigan Supreme Court Justice Joan Larsen to serve as a circuit judge, along with Colorado Supreme Court Justice Allison Eid and University of Pennsylvania law professor Stephanos Bibas. Larsen and Eid were on the short list of candidates for the Supreme Court that Trump released last year on his way to winning the GOP nomination for president. (Excerpted from Fox News.)