WASHINGTON -- Alaska Native leaders want the state's U.S. senators to support a hearing for a new Supreme Court justice, a move that would go against their party's insistence that the decision be left up to the next president.

On Thursday, Julie Kitka, president of the Alaska Federation of Natives, and Jacqueline Pata, executive director of the National Congress of American Indians, said Republican Sens. Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan should vet President Barack Obama's eventual Supreme Court nominee to replace deceased Justice Antonin Scalia, and urge their Senate colleagues to do so as well.

But that's not likely.

GOP leadership has been steadfast in opposition to holding a hearing to consider an Obama nominee, much less a vote. Murkowski, who waffled a bit by first suggesting she would be OK with a hearing for a nominee, later made it clear she thinks Obama shouldn't bother nominating anyone. Sullivan also strongly supports the GOP position -- no nominee until 2017.

Nevertheless, Kitka said it is "critically important" that the Supreme Court be made whole, and that the Constitution says "quite clearly" that the current president should nominate, and the Senate consider, a justice.

"It is in the country's best interest to have a working political system rather than one of gridlock," Kitka said.

Alaska Natives and "Indian tribes are affected by federal courts to a greater degree than almost any other group in the country," Pata said on a call with reporters, pointing to issues related to subsistence hunting on federal lands, child welfare issues and other federal tribal programs.

"It would not be good for Native people and our tribal governments if the Supreme Court is caught in a 4-4 tie for the next two years. If Congress doesn't even consider a nominee until after the next election, there will be a 4-4 tie for all of this year and next year's Supreme Court term, and important legal questions could be held in limbo for a long time, which creates uncertainty," Pata said.

Uncertainty is a problem for jobs, families and economies, Pata said.

Native groups have urged Obama to nominate someone from the West who has experience or interest in Native and natural resource issues, Pata and Kitka said.

The current makeup of the court includes six justices from the East Coast: four from New York, one from New Jersey and one from Georgia. Justices Stephen Breyer and Anthony Kennedy were born in California, San Francisco and Sacramento, respectively.

Indian and Native tribes in particular have been pushing for Obama to nominate Diane Humetewa, a citizen of the Hopi Nation and the first Indian woman to be a federal court judge, in Arizona. Humetewa once worked for Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona), and was nominated to be a U.S. attorney by President George W. Bush. Her district court position was unanimously approved by the Senate two years ago.