WASHINGTON (AP) – After nearly two years of legislative limbo that tested what lawmakers can and can’t do to block a judicial nominee, it was almost anticlimactic when William Pryor finally won his lifetime appointment June 9.

On the last day, with a Senate calendar devoted solely to arguments for and against the 11th Circuit nominee, it seemed partisans on both sides had little more to say.

As senators waited for the clock to strike 4:00 p.m., the prearranged time for a final vote, Pryor’s fate was a mere formality. That was determined last month when 14 moderate senators, seeking to avert a war over procedure, guaranteed up-or-down votes for Pryor and two other judicial nominees who had been blocked by a Democratic filibuster.

Pryor, 43, watched the vote with his staff over the Internet in his office in Birmingham, Ala. Aides broke out cake and champagne to celebrate after the confirmation.

“What a day,” Pryor said after a congratulatory call from Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., and Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala. “We even managed to get an opinion out.”

The arguments on Pryor were eerily similar, and in some cases, the rhetoric was identical, to more than two years ago when President Bush announced the former Alabama attorney general as his choice for the Atlanta appeals court.

Last week, there were numerous speeches for Pryor and a handful against, but the most prominent speech was silence. Time and again, the Senate clerk would begin a roll call of the body – a tactic used to delay the proceedings until a senator attempted a speech.

Often, several minutes went by without one.

Most prevalent was Sessions, Pryor’s predecessor as attorney general. Throughout the day, Sessions popped up to underscore Pryor’s virtues as a fair-minded judge.

“He is an extraordinary individual, a wonderful human being, a brilliant lawyer, a man of the highest integrity who has won the respect, support and confidence of the people of Alabama to an extraordinary degree,” Sessions said.

Critics were just as vocal, even though they knew their arguments were too little, too late.

“It’s not enough for him or any other nominee to simply say, ‘I’ll follow the law,’” said Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y. “His views are too well known, his record too clear about how he will vote as a judge.”

Although Schumer and other Democrats blasted Pryor’s positions on abortion, gay rights and civil rights, they also objected to the way in which he won a temporary spot on the 11th Circuit, which covers Alabama, Florida and Georgia.

Last year, Bush appointed Pryor to the post while Congress was out of town, further emboldening critics. The temporary term was to expire at the end of the year without action by the Senate.

“I would love to have the opportunity to do this for the rest of my life,” Pryor said in an interview with The Associated Press last May, shortly after being placed on the court.

The arguments from last week’s debate were nearly identical to those expressed two years ago during his confirmation hearing in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Despite enduring plenty of grilling, Pryor backed down from virtually nothing he had said or written in the past, including his position that the Voting Rights Act, which requires Southern states to get their redistricting plans approved by a court, had become outdated.

“I believed it has outlived its usefulness,” Pryor said. “I have, nevertheless, as attorney general actively enforced that law.”

Pryor’s Senate defenders pointed out last week that Georgia Attorney General Thurbert Baker, an African-American Democrat, had some similar views. They entered into the Senate record Baker’s endorsement of Pryor. In fact, they entered it twice.

“This is not out of the mainstream thinking,” said Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga. “It’s thoughtful and sincere analysis.”

Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., argued that Pryor was so independent as Alabama’s attorney general, it would be virtually impossible for him to win another statewide election. Critics and defenders alike found ammunition by comparing him to Roy Moore, the former Alabama chief justice who defied a court order concerning a Ten Commandments display.

Pryor’s detractors said his extreme conservative views are similar to Moore’s. But his supporters insisted Pryor’s actions were far different, most notably his public stance that Moore didn’t have a legal case even if his position was morally justified.

“It is not Mr. Pryor’s religious affiliation that is troubling,” said Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill. “It is his history of putting his own political beliefs ahead of the Constitution.”

On Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court decision that upholds a woman’s right to get an abortion, Pryor has acknowledged opposing that decision but promised to uphold it as long as it remains the law of the land.

Democrats also questioned a brief he filed in a Texas sodomy case in which he drew a legal analogy between homosexual acts and “prostitution, adultery, necrophilia, bestiality, possession of child pornography and even incest and pedophilia.”

During his confirmation hearing, he acknowledged rescheduling a family trip to Disney World to avoid “Gay Day.”

“My wife and I have two daughters who at the time were 6 and 4 years old,” he said. “We made a value judgment.”

A native of Mobile, Ala., Pryor has worked for government at either the state or federal level since 1995, when he was deputy attorney general under Sessions. He became attorney general after Sessions joined the Senate in 1997 and served in that role until his appointment to the court last year.

When Pryor was leaving the attorney general’s office, he said his proudest accomplishment was assembling a team that obtained more than 100 convictions for public corruption and white collar crime. Among them were Democrats and Republicans convicted of voter fraud.

In a state known for its tough criminal laws, Pryor was an early advocate for changing the laws to create alternative sentencing programs that would keep many nonviolent felons out of costly prisons. Part of his legacy as attorney general is the creation of the Alabama Sentencing Commission, which is still working to rewrite the state’s criminal laws and develop alternative sentencing programs.