Law School Dean Elena Kagan came one step closer to confirmation as the nation’s top representative to the Supreme Court yesterday, coasting through questions about her scant court experience and legal writings from senators who must approve her nomination.

Kagan elicited praise from members of the Senate Judiciary Committee on both sides of the aisle, who touted her credentials as a constitutional scholar.

While she faced questions about her lack of experience before the Supreme Court, writings on separation of church and state, and opposition to a law requiring universities accepting public funds to allow military recruiters on campus, Kagan’s confirmation continued to appear likely.

She left the chamber feeling “very pleased,” according to Charles Fried, a former solicitor general and professor at the Law School, who attended the hearing.

The hearing had particular significance due to the recent revelation that 75 year-old Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg suffers from an often-fatal form of pancreatic cancer. Kagan has been widely mentioned as a possible replacement on the high court, and media reports have described the hearing as a dress rehearsal for a potential Supreme Court nomination.

Kagan did face questions from Republican senators, who echoed concerns raised among some conservatives in recent weeks about how strongly she would defend the government when she personally disagreed with its stance.

Arlen Specter, the ranking Republican on the committee, challenged Kagan over memos she had written while clerking for Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall that asserted that religious organizations tend to promote their own beliefs via government-sponsored social programs.

Kagan batted aside the criticism by distancing herself from the remarks.

After reviewing the memos, Kagan dismissed her own work as “the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.”

“I was a 27 year-old pipsqueak, and I was working for an 80 year-old giant in the law,” she said.

Kagan’s opposition to the Solomon amendment, a law that requires military recruiters access to universities that accept federal funds, also drew fire, but she again brushed off the criticism, saying she would set aside her own beliefs as solicitor general.

Senators Tom Coburn, a Republican from Oklahoma, and Jon Kyl, a Republican from Arizona, contended that Kagan’s lack of Supreme Court experience might hurt her ability represent the government before the high court.

Saying that a “lifetime of learning and study of the law” is the central quality of a successful solicitor general, Kagan dismissed the criticism and pledged she would prove a quick study.

“I think that it’s just that these people have to have something to say,” Fried said, discounting criticism of Kagan’s lack of experience. “I don’t think it amounts to anything.”

No date has been set for a committee vote, and the committee record will remain open for a week, allowing nominees to submit written answers.

—Staff writer Elias J. Groll can be reached at egroll@fas.harvard.edu.