Illinois Senator Paul Simon, once said "The test for a Supreme Court nominee is not where he stands on any one specific issue. The test is this: Will you use your power on the court to restrict freedom or expand it?"

Hard to imagine 40 years ago people could be convicted of a crime, fined, sent to prison for using the most common forms of birth control.

We are dealing with the question of the 11 million people paying their taxes, having a path to legalization and, then, ultimately, to citizenship. Tough issues but we are coming together and I think we can do it.

The courage of federal Judge Frank Johnson is well-known.He was the one that gave the legal authority for the right to march from Selma to Montgomery, and he suffered dearly for it. He was ostracized and rejected. His life was threatened as a result of it.

I hope that Republicans in the House and Mr. Cantor will embrace that as part of immigration reform.

Our party is a diverse one, as is my home state of Illinois.

If you look at the record and the enviable record which Sandra Day O'Connor has written, you find she was the fifth and decisive vote to safeguard Americans' right to privacy, to require our courtrooms to grant access to the disabled, to allow the federal government to pass laws to protect the environment, to preserve the right of universities to use affirmative action, to ban the execution of children in America.