Arlen Specter’s switch in time (for the primary, that is) has raised two issues: who will assume the Ranking Minority Chair on the Senate Judiciary Committee and what the party make-up of that and other committees will be now that he and very likely Al Franken will increase the Democratic number to 60.

As to the first, Orrin Hatch is next up in seniority, but he has already served for six years in that spot. He therefore would need a “waiver” from the Republican conference. Sen. Chuck Grassley is next in order but is the Ranking Minority Chair on Finance. Under Republican conference rules he can not hold both chairs. However, he is term limited out at Finance come January 2011, so speculation is rampant that he might give it up now for Judiciary. Speaking to an informed source in GOP leadership, I was told that leadership currently believes that he doesn’t want to leave Finance now. However, some sort of deal to allow another member to take the Ranking Minority Chair on Judiciary until 2011 might be in the works. Next would be Jon Kyl but as Whip he would not serve. Then comes Sen. Jeff Sessions. As a former judge he, some think, would be well suited. He is a favorite of the conservative base which is now “lobbying” for him around the blogosphere.

There is much angst around the Right blogosphere that somehow Sen. Mitch McConnell is thwarting Sessions’s appointment as Ranking Minority Chair. This is simply wrong. McConnell has good relations with all three (Grassley, Hatch and Sessions) and is, sources tell me, content with them all. Moreover, it isn’t his call. The Senate Judiciary members vote on their Ranking Minority Chair. So stay tuned. In any event, conservatives will be better represented — much better — now that Specter is gone from the Ranking Minority Chair.

Then there is the issue about how many Republicans and Democrats sit on that and other committee. Senate Resolutions 18 and 19 set the committees’ make-up by name not by number or ratio. Specter therefore gets to stay put, albeit no longer as Ranking Minority Chair.

At the beginning of the Congressional session, McConnell and Harry Reid bargained out numbers which McConnell could appoint to each committee. Not surprisingly Reid has begun angling for more Democrats and fewer Republicans, something already underway by virtue of Specter’s migration from R to D on Judiciary (where the ratio will now be 12 to 7). The battle will continue. Without Franken there yet, the Republicans can filibuster a new resolution which might radically alter the ratio on committees. But once Franken arrives all bets are off.

The bottom line: Republicans will have a more conservative advocate in the Minority Ranking Chair on Judiciary no matter who is appointed, but they stand a real risk fielding fewer members on that and other committees. Never forget that elections have consequences. And if you didn’t think Norm Coleman had an incentive to battle on in his court case before, this is one more reminder that his colleagues will be cheering him to hang on to the bitter end.