Today, any nominee to a position requiring Senate confirmation can expect to spend many hours listing past places of residence, attaching tax returns, detailing family members’ campaign contributions, and answering questions about the employment of domestic help or gardening services and whether such employees were legal, tax-paying US residents. The vetting process will even go back to one’s teenage years – all to ensure that anything that the Senate’s own investigators can find is known before the nomination is formally submitted.
如今，任何职位的被提名人都要遭受参议院长达数小时的确认程序，交代曾在定居、上交纳税单、上报家族成员的竞选献金情况，并回答雇用仆人和园丁服务以及所雇佣者是否为合法的纳税美国居民等问题。审查程序甚至要回溯到当事人十几岁的孩提时代，所有这些都是为了确保参议院本身的调查员所能找的发现的东西在提名正式提交前便已众人皆知。