When the U.S. president nominates a candidate for a lower federal court, the chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee sends an inquiry printed on blue paper, known as a blue slip, to both U.S. senators from the nominee’s home state. Under the modern Senate blue slip process for federal judges, those two senators can return the form with a positive endorsement, return it with an objection, or refuse to return it at all. Since 2018, a single negative or withheld slip stops a U.S. district court nominee from getting a confirmation hearing, while U.S. circuit court of appeals nominees can still advance to a vote over home-state objections.
What happens during the Senate blue slip process for federal judges?
The blue slip is the Senate Judiciary Committee’s formal mechanism for enforcing senatorial courtesy, a long-standing political custom where senators defer to their colleagues on federal appointments within their home states. According to a 2003 Congressional Research Service report, the committee sends the blue form to both home-state senators regardless of whether they belong to the president’s political party or the opposition.
Because the practice gives home-state lawmakers direct influence over who sits on their local federal bench, the blue slip shapes a nomination before the president even announces a name. Each judicial vacancy follows a five-stage sequence from initial vetting to committee action:
- Before submitting a name, the White House Counsel’s office consults with both U.S. senators from the state where the vacancy exists, often working through bipartisan state nominating commissions to find candidates both senators will accept (Congressional Research Service, 2003).
- The president formally transmits the nomination to the U.S. Senate, which refers the candidate’s file to the Senate Committee on the Judiciary (Congressional Research Service, 2003).
- Committee counsel mails or delivers a blue paper form identifying the nominee and the specific court seat to both senators representing the nominee’s home state, or the home state of the outgoing judge for an appellate seat (Congressional Research Service, 2003).
- Each home-state senator chooses one of three options: return the blue slip marked favorably, return it marked unfavorably, or withhold the slip by never sending it back to the committee (Ballotpedia, 2024).
- The Judiciary Committee chair decides whether to schedule a confirmation hearing based on the returned slips and the type of court seat being filled (Ballotpedia, 2024; U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, 2026).
If you look for the blue slip in the U.S. Constitution’s Appointments Clause or the Standing Rules of the Senate, you will not find it. According to a 2017 Senate Judiciary Committee history, the procedure is an informal courtesy governed entirely by the sitting committee chair. Because it is not a written rule, the chair can modify or abolish the requirement at the start of or during any two-year Congress without a Senate floor vote (Thompson Coburn LLP, 2026).
Which federal courts require two positive blue slips?
Whether a home-state senator can unilaterally block a nominee depends on which level of the federal judiciary the president is trying to fill. According to a 2023 Alliance for Justice fact sheet, the Senate Judiciary Committee has enforced a split policy since January 2018 that separates single-state trial courts from multi-state appellate courts.
For U.S. District Courts—the federal trial courts whose geographic jurisdiction stays within a single state—committee chairs from both parties require two positive blue slips before scheduling a hearing (Ballotpedia, 2024). If either home-state senator returns a negative slip or keeps the form in a desk drawer, the nomination stalls in committee until it expires at the end of the congressional session (Ballotpedia, 2024). As of 2026, this single-senator veto also applies to nominations for U.S. Attorneys and U.S. Marshals, according to a 2026 analysis by Thompson Coburn LLP.
For U.S. Courts of Appeals—the regional circuit courts that hear appeals across several states—home-state senators no longer hold a veto. Republican Chairman Chuck Grassley ended the blue slip veto for circuit court nominees in 2018, arguing that appellate courts make national policy across multiple states rather than serving a single state’s legal community (Alliance for Justice, 2023). Subsequent Judiciary Committee chairs, including Republican Lindsey Graham (2019–2021), Democrat Dick Durbin (2021–2025), and Chuck Grassley in the 119th Congress (2025–2026), kept that division in place: circuit nominees can receive a hearing and floor vote without positive blue slips as long as the White House consulted the home-state senators beforehand (Ballotpedia, 2024; U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, 2026).
The U.S. Supreme Court sits outside the blue slip system altogether. Because Supreme Court justices exercise nationwide jurisdiction rather than filling a seat tied to one state, the Judiciary Committee never sends blue slips for high court nominees (Ballotpedia, 2024).
How did the blue slip change from an advisory notice into a veto?
A common misconception is that a single senator’s blue slip has always stopped judicial nominations in their tracks. When the Senate Judiciary Committee first created the form in 1917 during the 65th Congress, a negative response did not halt a nomination (Congressional Research Service, 2003). For its first 39 years, from 1917 through 1955, 11 consecutive committee chairs treated a negative slip as an advisory warning rather than a barrier to a committee hearing (U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, 2017).
The earliest recorded blue slip objection took place on April 9, 1917, when Democratic Senator Thomas Hardwick of Georgia objected to a nominee for the Southern District of Georgia, writing on the form that the appointment was “personally offensive and objectionable to me” (Congressional Research Service, 2003; U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, 2017). Rather than burying the nomination in committee, the Judiciary Committee held its review and sent the nominee to the full Senate floor with an adverse report, where the Senate voted him down (Congressional Research Service, 2003). As political scientists Sarah Binder and Forrest Maltzman noted in a study cited by a 2018 Heritage Foundation report, the original blue slip acted as an “early warning system, not an absolute veto” for the committee chair.
Even the text printed on early forms reflected that advisory role. According to a 1979 Judiciary Committee staff memorandum cited by the Congressional Research Service (2003), historic blue slips carried a deadline notice telling the home-state senator that “unless a reply is received from you within a week from this date, it will be assumed that you have no objection.”
That practice changed in 1956 under Chairman James O. Eastland of Mississippi. Following the Supreme Court’s 1954 school desegregation ruling in Brown v. Board of Education, Eastland altered committee policy so that a single negative or unreturned blue slip automatically killed a judicial nomination without a hearing, allowing Southern senators to block federal judicial candidates seen as sympathetic to civil rights integration (Alliance for Justice, 2023; U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, 2017). Eastland kept that absolute veto in place until he retired in 1978 (U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, 2017).
In 1979, Democratic Chairman Edward M. Kennedy ended Eastland’s automatic pocket veto so a lone senator could no longer silently kill a nomination by refusing to return the form (Congressional Research Service, 2003; Alliance for Justice, 2023). Over the next four decades, chairs adjusted the standard depending on White House consultation. Under Chairs Strom Thurmond (1981–1987), Joe Biden (1987–1995), and Orrin Hatch (1995–2001, 2003–2005), a negative blue slip weighed heavily against a nominee, though chairs reserved the right to move a candidate forward if the president had consulted the home-state senators in good faith (Congressional Research Service, 2003; Brennan Center for Justice, 2017). Between 2005 and 2007, Republican Chairman Arlen Specter explicitly distinguished between district court nominations, where a negative slip halted action, and circuit court nominations, where it did not (Brennan Center for Justice, 2017). Democratic Chairman Patrick Leahy (2001–2003, 2007–2015) and Republican Chairman Chuck Grassley during the final two years of the Obama administration (2015–2017) required two positive blue slips for both district and circuit nominees before Grassley removed circuit courts from the veto in 2018 (U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, 2017; Alliance for Justice, 2023).
Why do senators still fight over the blue slip today?
The stakes surrounding the blue slip rose sharply after November 21, 2013, when the Senate voted 52–48 to eliminate the 60-vote filibuster threshold for lower federal court nominees (Heritage Foundation, 2018). Before that rules change, minority-party senators could band together on the Senate floor to block any district or circuit nominee who lacked 60 votes. Once floor confirmation required only a simple majority, the committee blue slip became the primary tool left for an opposition-party senator to influence who gets appointed to their state’s federal trial courts (Heritage Foundation, 2018).
When both branches cooperate, the district court blue slip forces the White House to strike bipartisan deals in states represented by one or two senators from the opposing party. According to June 2026 remarks from Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley, opposition-party senators returned more than 180 positive blue slips for U.S. district court nominees combined across the first Trump administration (2017–2021) and the Biden administration (2021–2025). In practice, senators often trade support by agreeing to return blue slips for a package of nominees that includes candidates recommended by both the White House and the home-state senators (Congressional Research Service, 2003).
Frequently asked questions
Is a judicial blue slip the same thing as revenue blue-slipping?
No. In congressional procedure, “blue-slipping” also refers to a separate constitutional rule where the U.S. House of Representatives returns a tax or tariff bill to the Senate printed on blue paper because the Constitution’s Origination Clause requires revenue bills to start in the House (Congressional Research Service, 2025). That legislative process has no connection to federal judicial nominations.
What happens if a state has two senators from different political parties?
Both senators receive a blue slip for every U.S. district court vacancy in their state, and both must return a positive slip for the nominee to get a Judiciary Committee hearing (Ballotpedia, 2024). In split-delegation states, the two senators frequently form a joint bipartisan screening panel to interview candidates and recommend consensus names to the president before a nomination is made (Congressional Research Service, 2003).
Where can you check current blue slip policies for a specific Congress?
Because the Judiciary Committee chair sets the policy at the start of each two-year Congress, the official rules and public statements are published by the U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary at judiciary.senate.gov and tracked by the Congressional Research Service (U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, 2026).