I’m Feeling A Little Better…
Written by Gary on October 7th, 2005I won’t lie. Upon first hearing President Bush’s nomination of Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court, I was supremely devastated. However, over the past 4 days I have begun to feel a bit better about the nomination. This is due to the fact that many prominent, solid conservative leaders have readily and wholeheartedly endorsed Ms. Miers for the Court. Here is the running list:
1) Dr. James Dobson (need I say more)
2) David N. O’Steen - Executive Director, National Right to Life Committee
3) Jay Sekulow, Chief Counsel - American Center for Law and Justice (he was very instrumental in the selection of Judge John Roberts)
4) Roberta Combs - Christian Coalition of America
5) Dr. Richard Land - For Faith and Family
‘
Now, with that said, I am still weary of Ms. Miers’ ascendance to the Supreme Court. Conservatives have been told on three separate occasions, “don’t worry, he’s conservative.” And in each situation conservatives have lost badly. I am referring to the nominations of Justice Stevens, Kennedy and Souter. Conservatives were reassured on each occasion that the respective judges were unimpeachable originalists. We were told to just “trust us.”
Given the failures of the past, we have a right and a duty to be cautiously concerned with Harriet Miers. Any politically astute observer will recognize that the rhetoric surrounding Ms. Miers and her unknown judicial philosophy is eerily reminiscent to that of Stevens, Kennedy and Souter. We seem to be going down the same precarious road again.
I trust President Bush, especially on judicial nominees, but he could have delivered an immensely more solid and reliable candidate. In the process of trying to appease the Democrats, Bush demoralized the conservative grassroots - the very heart of the Republican Party.
We conservatives should not have to tolerate such an unnecessary risk on this “stealth candidate.” We voted for Bush precisely because we did not want to gamble our liberties and the lives of unborn children on moderate judges. Indeed, the issues and values at stake are far too important to be invested in the whims of Ms. Miers - a woman who has no apparent judicial convictions or record and a largely mysterious political ideology. In short, we just don’t know, and this is unacceptable.
The real test will be in this upcoming Court term or the next, when Justice Miers will most definitely hand down a ruling on an abortion related issue. If Miers votes the right way, all is forgiven and President Bush’s decision will be vindicated. If not, the Republican Party will have been irreparably damaged, and we’ll pay dearly for it in ‘06 and ‘08.
7
PM
Oh, now I feel much better. All of the theocrats support Miers. She must be awesome!
7
PM
None of this deals with the numerous conservative complaints, namely…
- Bush dodged a public debate over what our judiciary should look like
- If he didn’t have the balls to push an anti-Roe (which is different from being pro-life) judge with a 55 seat majority, he’s created a de facto ban on being anti-Roe.
- Miers is incredibly underqualified, having never been in a position to have to consider how one should interpret the Constitution. (Just a few acceptable positions would have included a clerkship to an appellate judge, editing a law review, or teaching law.)
You can see a partial laundry list of problems here.
I’d also add that having the support of various evangelicals doesn’t actually speak to your ability to your originalist credentials. Sekulow matters, a little, but he’s an establishment Republican.
8
AM
Tom Tancredo is against confirming Miers. I trust him over the establishment, even the conservative establishment.
8
AM
Shipwrecked, why all of a sudden does a significant presence at the ABA and President of the Texas Bar Association not qualify her for being able to “interpret the Constitution?”
Also your claim that Bush is somehow “banning” pro-lifers is just baloney. What, may I ask, is Harriet Miers? Where were you during Bush’s nomination of John Roberts? And where have you been during all of Bush’s nominees to appellate circuits?
Also, Bush is not dodging a debate. It is a simple fact of life that unless we pull one over on the left, we will not be able to overturn Roe v. Wade. Bush has pulled two over on the left now. One to go.
8
AM
Its bizzaro world!
8
PM
Joey T,
You should take more care to read what I write. I never said that Bush was banning pro-lifers, I said he was creating a de facto ban on openly anti-Roe nominees. John Roberts was not openly anti-Roe (though I feel confident his jurisprudence is such that it does not support Roe.) Harriet Miers may be personally pro-life, but that doesn’t mean she’ll be a good vote on the court, and unlike Roberts we have nothing by which to discern her judicial theory and explicate that to specific cases. In contrast, Judge Bork was personally pro-abortion, but it was his anti-Roe stance that made him persona non grata in the Senate.
As to the ABA, it was Mark Levin who commented at either Bench Memos or the Corner that there are a great many active ABA members he wouldn’t trust to argue a traffic ticket, let alone constitutional law. It is very discomforting to find that she chaired a committee that was in favor of an international criminal court. It offers only the mildest of comfort that she opposed a top-down decision for the ABA to take a pro-abortion stance. Who knows what she would have done if it had come up from below?
8
PM
“If Miers votes the right way, all is forgiven and President Bush’s decision will be vindicated.”
And the other issues . . .? Abortion is not the only thing on the plate.
8
PM
More to the point, she may vote the right way, but why will she vote that way? This is extremely important as any majority opinion she writes will create precedent.
For example, in the recent decision permitting interstate wine sales the majority consisted of Souter, Kennedy, Scalia, Ginsburg, and Breyer. Obviously Scalia and, say, Souter approached the question from different judicial philosophies, and those differences would come through in the opinion they write. Whoever writes the holding opinion would go on to shape constitutional law for perhaps yeas to come.
Clearly, you can see why it matters so much to know what a nominees judicial philosophy is.