Since President Obama took office, Senate Republicans have used every weapon in their arsenal to slow down or prevent altogether confirmation of his judicial nominees. With partisan obstruction as their lodestar, they have abandoned the principles they professed to have when they were pushing for rapid confirmation of President Bush’s nominees.

But one Republican stands out as an exception: Senator Lisa Murkowski.

When it came time to break the outrageous filibuster of Goodwin Liu, Senator Murkowski was the lone Republican not to salute and obey when her party leadership pushed her to vote against cloture. Last week, she again stood alone among her party and voted to end the partisan filibuster of Caitlin Halligan.

We thank Senator Murkowski for standing on principle.

Today, Sen. Murkowski’s efforts to end the obstruction of a highly qualified Alaskan nominee to the Ninth Circuit are bearing fruit. Morgan Christen’s nomination has had the strong, bipartisan backing of both Sen. Murkowski and Democratic Sen. Mark Begich. The workload in that part of the Ninth Circuit has become so bad as to be officially declared a judicial emergency. Late summer, Christen’s nomination was approved unanimously by the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Christen should have received a floor vote expeditiously, and that is what Sen. Murkowski requested. Unfortunately, Republican leadership put partisanship against President Obama over all other factors and prevented a floor vote for over three months, until today. This afternoon, to no one’s surprise, she was confirmed with overwhelming bipartisan support (the vote was 95-3).

We often disagree with Sen. Murkowski on issues and expect to do so in the future. But when it comes to President Obama’s judicial nominees, we agree. Sen. Murkowski’s lonely stands for principle over party deserve praise.