WASHINGTON – The U.S. Senate today voted to correct what Senator Claire McCaskill called “a grievous error,” as she successfully rallied support for the confirmation of former Missouri Supreme Court Chief Justice Ronnie White to a federal judgeship.

White, whose earlier nomination to the federal bench was defeated in a controversial vote in 1999, was approved today to serve on the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri by a vote of 53-44. Today’s vote was an exceedingly rare instance in which the Senate voted on a judicial nominee whose earlier nomination was defeated in a floor vote.

“It’s not often that the Senate has a chance to go back and fix a grievous error,” McCaskill said today in a speech on the Senate floor. “And that grievous error occurred when a good and qualified man was defeated in the U.S. Senate… There was an attack on Ronnie White for being ‘soft on crime,’ [but his record] flies in the face of that assertion.”

McCaskill called White an “iconic leader” in Missouri who “handled what happened to him with as much character” as possible, and praised her colleagues for “righting this wrong” and granting White a “well-deserved place on the federal bench.”

A graduate of St. Louis Community College, St. Louis University, and the University of Missouri – Kansas City Law School, Ronnie White served three terms in the Missouri House of Representatives. He served on the Missouri Court of Appeals, and he became the first African-American to sit on the state’s Supreme Court, sworn in at a courthouse where slaves were once sold on the steps. He is also a veteran of the U.S. Army Reserves.

White was nominated in 1997 by then-President Bill Clinton for a United States district court seat. White’s nomination was approved by the Senate Judiciary Committee, but was ultimately defeated after a controversial debate in which White was accused of being “pro-criminal,” a campaign later labeled by current Judiciary Committee Chairman Pat Leahy of Vermont as “outrageous,” and by Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois as “disgraceful.”

Last year, President Barack Obama re-nominated White to serve on the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri—a nomination supported by the Fraternal Order of Police, and approved today by the Senate.