"It is essential that we provide the president with the tools and resources he needs to effect change, and that starts with putting a national security team in place as soon as possible," said Senator John F. Kerry of Massachusetts, chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee.
Obama's presidential-campaign rival, Senator John McCain, was also among those who spoke in Clinton's favor.
"This nation has come together in a way that it has not for some time," said the Arizona Republican, on the Senate floor for the first time since the inauguration. Voters "want us to work together and get to work."
Clinton was quickly sworn into office and planned to report today to the State Department, where she was expected to address employees in the main lobby - a tradition for secretaries of state on their first day on the job.
But Obama's choice for attorney general hit a roadblock yesterday when Eric Holder's bid to become the nation's first African-American chief law enforcement officer was delayed for at least a week as Republicans demanded more time to question him about harsh interrogations, Guantanamo trials, and other topics.
While Republicans invoked the automatic one-week delay that Senate Judiciary Committee rules permit, Holder's confirmation does not appear in doubt. Senator Patrick Leahy, a Vermont Democrat who is chairman of the panel, said he was very disappointed by the Republicans' delay. "But they have that right," he said, lamenting that "this historic nomination is held over."
And Treasury Secretary-designate Timothy Geithner, interrogated about his failure to pay $34,000 in Social Security and Medicare taxes from 2001 to 2004, apologized to Congress yesterday, saying the mistakes were "careless" and "avoidable."
Geithner told the Senate Finance Committee, which plans to vote today on his nomination, that he was sorry that his past transgressions while working for the International Monetary Fund were now an issue in his confirmation at a time of deepening economic distress.
Geithner told the panel that, for the 2001 and 2002 tax years, he had prepared his tax returns himself with a popular tax-preparation computer program. He said that he hired an accountant to do his 2003 and 2004 returns, and the accountant also "did not catch my error." He acknowledged signing an IMF statement saying he was aware that it was his responsibility to fully pay Social Security and Medicare taxes.
Senator Charles Grassley of Iowa, the senior Republican on the panel, noted that as Treasury secretary, Geithner would be in charge of the Internal Revenue Service and should therefore come under especially tight scrutiny on the issue of paying his personal taxes.
He suggested the danger of "sweeping under the rug" Geithner's tax problems in a rush to get him confirmed.
"I have paid what I owed," Geithner said under questioning from Grassley.
Although the tax disclosures provided a bump in Geithner's confirmation process, he appeared to have wide support from both parties.
