WASHINGTON -- The Senate yesterday confirmed three more appellate court nominees who had long been stymied by Democratic filibusters, giving President Bush another victory from a bipartisan accord that averted a partisan showdown over judicial appointments.

Two of the nominees passed unanimously, but Democrats fiercely contested the third, former Alabama Attorney General William Pryor. Three Republicans voted against him in a rare break with their party's president.

The Senate voted 53 to 45 to confirm Pryor, 43, for a lifetime appointment to the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta. Pryor has served on the court since early last year due to Bush's recess appointment, but he would have been forced off the bench this year had the Senate not acted.

Republican Sens. Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island, Susan Collins of Maine and Olympia Snowe of Maine voted against Pryor. Two Democrats, Sens. Ben Nelson of Nebraska and Ken Salazar of Colorado, voted for him. Sens. James Jeffords, I-Vt., and Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, did not vote.

Liberals have denounced Pryor's opposition to abortion and his criticisms of the Voting Rights Act and the Supreme Court's death-penalty rulings. But Sen. Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., said Pryor "has an outstanding record on civil rights. ...Those who criticize Judge Pryor's record have not examined it with the care and respect" it deserved.

Pryor joins Priscilla Owen of Texas and Janice Rogers Brown of California as newly confirmed appellate court nominees who were championed by conservatives but strenuously opposed by liberals. They were among 10 nominees filibustered in Bush's first term in a battle over the federal judiciary that grew increasingly bitter after Bush's re-election.

Last month, seven Democratic senators and seven Republicans agreed to a deal that cleared the path for Pryor, Owen and Brown. The GOP signers in return agreed to scuttle Frist's threat to change Senate rules to ban judicial filibusters. Many senators say the accord's toughest test will come over Supreme Court vacancies.

The Senate yesterday unanimously confirmed Richard Griffin and David McKeague, both of Michigan, to the 6th Circuit appeals court in Cincinnati. They were among the 10 filibustered nominees from Bush's first term. Democrats' objections to them had focused on GOP stalling tactics that prevented confirmation votes for several of former President Bill Clinton's nominees from Michigan.

The 14 Senate negotiators, who signed a two-page agreement last month, have said two other contested appellate court nominees -- William Myers of Idaho and Henry Saad of Michigan -- will remain blocked. That is relatively small consolation, some Democrats said yesterday. "It is bitter medicine," Democratic Whip Richard Durbin of Illinois said of the confirmations of Pryor, Brown and Owen. "I'm not happy with it."

Collins said in a statement that she was worried about Pryor's temperament and "respect for the judicial system." She noted that he once said of a Supreme Court death-penalty ruling, "This issue should not be decided by nine octogenarian lawyers who happen to sit on the Supreme Court."