This is the Cato Daily Podcast for Thursday, March 17th, 2016.

I'm Caleb Brown.

There is a lot wrong with the process the Senate uses to confirm or reject federal judges. So says Cato

adjunct scholar Josh Blackman. He argues instead that senators if they are to

continue to have hearings at all should be asking potential judges about

the original meaning of the Constitution and about their judicial philosophy.

In their current form, judicial confirmation hearings have become a show.

The candidate gets up there, preaches fidelity to the law,

and says absolutely nothing of any merit.

I think part of the problem is that the senators are asking the wrong questions.

So a few months ago, Randy Barnett and I wrote a piece in the weekly standards

at five lessons for the next Supreme Court justice.

And we offer some concrete tips of how the confirmation process can be improved.

In its current form, it's basically worthless.

So one of the methods in which the confirmation process can be confirmed

is instead of asking a candidate about specific cases, let's ask them about

clauses of the Constitution and how they were originally understood.

And I'll give you a very easy example.

During Justice Sotomayor's confirmation hearings a few years ago, she was asked about

District of Columbia v Heller. This was the landmark Second Amendment case where the Supreme

Court held that the right to keep him bear arms is an individual right.

So de Meyer was asked about Heller and she said that Heller was quote settled law, settled law.

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