This is the hearing entitled:
"Short-change for Consumers and Short-shrift for Congress? The Supreme Court’s Treatment of Laws that Protect Americans’ Health, Safety, Jobs and Retirement "
Comment Of Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.),
Chairman, Senate Judiciary Committee,
On Republican Objections To Committee Hearings
June 11, 2008
This morning an all too familiar pattern was underscored when a hearing on a topic our Republican colleagues did not like was cut short, without warning, by an anonymous Republican objection. Today’s hearing was scheduled to examine the impact on real people – on all Americans – of Supreme Court decisions that have stripped protections for American workers and consumers. The hearing began with the Ranking Member noting how important it is that we discuss these issues, and he was right. In recent decisions, the Supreme Court has misconstrued our laws, ignored the intent of Congress, and ultimately prevented state court juries from providing redress for misconduct that has harmed ordinary Americans.
The anonymous Republican objection prematurely shut the hearing down in the middle of Senator Whitehouse’s first round of witness questioning. I share the sentiments Senator Whitehouse expressed before recessing the hearing – this behavior is a disgrace to the Senate, and it is especially shameful given that the victims who traveled a long way to tell their stories to the Committee did not get a full hearing.
Republicans in the Senate earlier this year blocked Senate action on a bill to remedy one of these egregious Supreme Court decisions, and now they will not even listen to ordinary Americans who have been hurt. This objection signals that Republicans were perhaps concerned that, through today’s hearing, Americans will understand that “activist judges” include those conservative Supreme Court Justices who are misconstruing laws intended to protect American consumers? Whose side are our Republican colleagues on when they turn off the microphones of ordinary Americans trying to tell us what we need to hear about the injustice they have endured? Whosever bidding they were doing in shutting this hearing down, it was not done on behalf of the American people.
http://leahy.senate.gov/press/200806/061108c.html