Grassley worried about Sotomayor 'filling vacuums'

The old “once bitten, twice shy” adage played into Sen. Chuck Grassley's vote against Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor.

The old “once bitten, twice shy” adage played into Sen. Chuck Grassley's vote against Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor.

Grassley, who joined five of the other six Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee in voting against recommending Sotomayor's confirmation, said Wednesday concern about her lack of support for gun ownership also influenced his decision.

However, Grassley said that other than the timing of the issues, there's no connection between his vote against President Barack Obama's nominee and the heat he is taking from conservatives for his work on health care reform.

Sotomayor, in her testimony before the Judiciary Committee, failed to convince him that she wouldn't be a judicial activist, legislating from the bench. In that, she reminded Grassley too much of Justice David Souter, who Sotomayor was nominated to confirm, Grassley said in a conference calls with Iowa reporters.

“He was always talking about vacuums in the law the Supreme Court might have to fill,” Grassley said. “Well, that's a legislative function and they shouldn't be filling vacuums.”

Grassley said he raised the issue with previous nominees and was generally satisfied they believed that was not the court's proper role.

Although Sotomayor didn't say it was the role of justices to fill vacuums, she talked around the issue in a way that reminded him why he regrets his vote to confirm Souter.

“He's the only one that I made a misjudgment of,” Grassley said. “He turned out differently than I anticipated. He's the only one of the judges I voted for, Republican or Democratic, that I'm sorry I voted for. So I wasn't going to make the same mistake twice.”