Bush sets short list for court - Sources name 2 conservative appeals judges
In the immortal words of Ronnie Ray-Gun, “Mr. Bush, there you go again.”
I can't believe I saw this Chicago Tribune headline:
I can't believe I saw this Chicago Tribune headline:
Bush sets short list for court
Sources name 2 conservative appeals judges
Published October 30, 2005 - Chicago Tribune Washington Bureau
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0510300283oct30,1,2576545.story?coll=chi-news-hed&ctrack=1&cset=true
Sources name 2 conservative appeals judges
Published October 30, 2005 - Chicago Tribune Washington Bureau
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0510300283oct30,1,2576545.story?coll=chi-news-hed&ctrack=1&cset=true
Hoping to use the smoke from the own prairie fire of bad news for his administration lately, Mr Bush holds fast to the ‘holier than thou/superior’ posture of the Republican party and has released a short list of Super Conservatives as potential next picks for the Supreme Court. Mr Bush is expected to announce today or Monday, that he has narrowed the focus to Judges Samuel Alito of New Jersey and J. Michael Luttig of Virginia. But don't rule out Priscilla Owens. Mr Bush hasn;t met a judicila appointment he didn;t like her for, and doesn't know the meaning of the word, DENIED!
Let’s examine shall we:
J. Michael Luttig
On first look you could say that Judge J. Michael Luttig, a conservative with a legal pedigree that includes clerkships for Judge Antonin Scalia, on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in 1982-83 and for Chief Justice Warren E. Burger in 1983-84 was the most Roberts like nominee. You have to dig deeper…oh and read his blog…(don’t these guys know those tings are public?) Luttig is regarded as a staunch federalist in the mold of Justices Scalia and Thomas.
Judge Luttig, a George H.W. Bush nominated judge, has long been a prominent player in national legal circles and a rising star among conservatives during his decade-long seat on the appeals court.
"His reputation is one of an extremely smart, hard-line conservative," said Heather Gerken, an assistant professor at Harvard Law School. Gerken also says that Judge Luttig, “is recognized as one of the nation's most prominent "feeder" judges, whose clerks go on to be law clerks at the Supreme Court” who are reputed to be among the most conservative clerks in the high court (and if they follow in his footsteps, potential conservative Supreme Court nominees themselves).
Two years ago, Judge Luttig wrote an opinion striking down the Violence Against Women Act that would have allowed women to sue their attackers for monetary damages, In 1998, he reversed a lower court ruling and upheld a Virginia ban on partial birth abortion. A year earlier he issued a ruling allowing the state to require parental notification before a teen-ager could obtain an abortion.
Judge Luttig has accorded deference to the basic principles of abortion rights, which might wrongly turn some political conservatives against him, approvingly cited statements from Casey and Stenberg that Roe v. Wade should be upheld, stating that judges should not inject personal affinities into decisions of law, and that, “abortion, as a right granted by the Supreme Court, is unassailable as precedent unless or until overturned by the Supreme Court’.
Judge Luttig spoke in a panel discussion during the 2003 convention of the American Constitution Society (FYI - a liberal policy organization whose arch enemy is The Federalist Society) on judicial activism. In which Judge Luttig defined activism as "the substitution of a judge's personal predelictions for law, whatever form that substitution takes." He then spoke out strongly against "activism" by judges of all stripes: "...it should not matter to either jurist [conservative or liberal], that his activism is employed in moderation. The conservative and liberal jurist alike should regard activism in moderation as no more defensible than activism in excess, the attempted defense of such as folly." He closed by saying, “I think we risk that when, after vicious confirmation hearings in which these labels are thrown around without definition, we risk that the judicial employee, regardless of their conscientiousness, will fall into the belief that he or she should vote a particular way, because that is the political platform of the appointing president. And when that occurs, there will, indeed, be no difference... between politics and law."
A hint at Judge Luttig’s independent streak that, consistent with his judicial philosophy, might not make him attractive to any hyper-politicized folks in the Bush administration, and subject to a venomous and acerbic confirmation fight to the post of Supreme Court Justice. Here, he's hoping get that chance. I can’t believe they actually say these things.
http://jmluttig.blogspot.com/
Monday, October 03, 2005
HAIRY-ETTE: ALL EYELINER, NO JURISPRUDENCE
Every hour that goes by, the more depressed I get. It's not that I'm mad about not being appointed to the Supreme Court. (I mean, I am, but this is much bigger than that.) It's that the President of the United States, whom at this point I wouldn't allow one of my clerks to hire as a manual laborer, had to choose such a sycophantic lightweight to fill what would have been my seat. The only possible distinction that Hairy-Ette might hold is she's the first Supreme Court nominee whose eyeliner is thicker than her curriculum vitae.
Samuel Alito
Judge Alito was the sole dissenter on the Third Circuit in “Planned Parenthood v. Casey”, wisely struck down a Pennsylvania law that required women seeking abortions to consult their husbands. His case: That a majority of probable reasons for an abortion (economic constraints, future plans, the husbands' previously expressed opposition, etc) may prevent and “make unnecessary” through ‘talking it out” an abortion." What if SHE decided she didn’t want the bay? What if the husband was abusive and was using a ‘forced’ pregnancy to keep the wife a salve and victim of that marriage. The case went on to the Supreme Court, and the lower upheld the court's decision 6 to 3.
Lawrence Lustberg, a New Jersey criminal defense lawyer who has tried numerous cases before Judge Alito on the Third Circuit since 1981, describes him as "an activist conservatist judge" who narrowly construes prisoners' and criminals' rights and is "very prosecutorial from the bench.” “He has looked to be creative in his conservatism, which is, I think, as much a Rehnquist as a Scalia trait," Lustberg says.
"Scalito" as he is regarded, for his views resembling those of conservative Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, Judge Samuel Alito Jr. also appears to not know what is appropriate behavior for a Federal Judge, much less Supreme Court Associate Justice. Lucky for us he writes a regular blog. http://samuelalito.blogspot.com/ You have to read this. It is frightening, his lack of discretion or apparent lack of concern for perception of his personal judgment.
A favorite son of the political right, weith strong ties to former Republican administrations, Judge Alito was appointed in 1990 by George H.W. Bush to the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, Judge Alito has been in frequent, vocal dissent in a court that has been historically liberal.
Priscilla Owen
Judge Owen’s steadfast conservative legal opinions mirror her, inarguable judicial activism (even by Judge Owen herself, on numerous occasions) that falls outside the mainstream and out at grave risk the continued vigorous enforcement of constitutional and legal rights in the areas of civil rights and civil liberties. Owen too often used the power of the bench to promote her own ultra-conservative, pro-corporate views. Owen was out of the mainstream, even by Texas standards
Supporters called Judge Owen a no-nonsense, "consistent conservative" with long experience as a state-court judge. Opponents criticize her conservative positions on red hot social and economic issues, her pro-corporate and her pro-life posture.
On July 23, 2002, the Senate Judiciary Committee held its first hearing on Priscilla Owen. Attended by most members of the Committee, this day-long hearing allowed for an exhaustive review Judge Owen’s record and allowed her numerous opportunities to clarify her record and/or opportunity to rebut the allegations being made about her judicial activism. Unable to satisfy the Committee that she would not be a judicial activist, and her nomination was voted down by the Committee on September 5, 2002
Senators rejected Owen for appointment to the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit because of her record as an activist Texas Supreme Court justice who repeatedly ruled against reproductive rights, open government, environmental protection and workers and consumers.
In a series of cases beginning in 2000, Justice Owen and the Texas Supreme Court had to interpret a Texas statute that allowed young women to obtain a judicial bypass rather than notifying their parents that they intended to exercise their right to choose legal abortion. In these “Jane Doe” cases, repeatedly the Texas high court rejected one of many attempts by Owen to prevent a young woman from obtaining an abortion by placing insurmountable hurdles between young women and their constitutional right to choose, hurdles that could not and cannot be justified, causing one of the justices, who formed the majority, to explicitly denounce Owen's effort to thwart the clear intent of the law, declaring (in a very Owen-esque tone) her actions as "an unconscionable act of judicial activism."
The Texas justice who identified Owen as a radical jurist, US Attorney General Alberto Gonzales finds himself. Gonzales argued, in another example, that one of Owen's positions taken in dissent would "judicially amend" a statute for the benefit of manufacturers selling defective products. On abortion, Democrats criticized Owen for consistenly voting against judicial overrides of Texas's parental-notification abortion law. On a court with nine Republican appointees,
Although Owen has not had occasion as a judge to interpret Roe or Casey, her judicial activism in the Jane Doe cases is strongly predictive of a judge who would draw sharp limits on the protection to the right to choose afforded by Roe as reaffirmed in Casey. The Casey "undue burden" standard allows significant discretion from lower court judges in determining when a restriction on access to abortion is constitutional. It is clear from the Jane Doe cases that Owen would use this discretion to continue to chip away at women's reproductive rights
Owen's parental notification opinions show a willingness to use judicial activism to rewrite statutes she finds unappealing. Her abortion dissents have been characterized as "inflammatory and irresponsible rhetoric" and she has been chastised by her own colleagues on the conservative Texas Supreme Court for "impos[ing her] own personal convictions into what must be a strictly legal inquiry." Her nomination must continue to be rejected by the Senate.
Let’s examine shall we:
J. Michael Luttig
On first look you could say that Judge J. Michael Luttig, a conservative with a legal pedigree that includes clerkships for Judge Antonin Scalia, on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in 1982-83 and for Chief Justice Warren E. Burger in 1983-84 was the most Roberts like nominee. You have to dig deeper…oh and read his blog…(don’t these guys know those tings are public?) Luttig is regarded as a staunch federalist in the mold of Justices Scalia and Thomas.
Judge Luttig, a George H.W. Bush nominated judge, has long been a prominent player in national legal circles and a rising star among conservatives during his decade-long seat on the appeals court.
"His reputation is one of an extremely smart, hard-line conservative," said Heather Gerken, an assistant professor at Harvard Law School. Gerken also says that Judge Luttig, “is recognized as one of the nation's most prominent "feeder" judges, whose clerks go on to be law clerks at the Supreme Court” who are reputed to be among the most conservative clerks in the high court (and if they follow in his footsteps, potential conservative Supreme Court nominees themselves).
Two years ago, Judge Luttig wrote an opinion striking down the Violence Against Women Act that would have allowed women to sue their attackers for monetary damages, In 1998, he reversed a lower court ruling and upheld a Virginia ban on partial birth abortion. A year earlier he issued a ruling allowing the state to require parental notification before a teen-ager could obtain an abortion.
Judge Luttig has accorded deference to the basic principles of abortion rights, which might wrongly turn some political conservatives against him, approvingly cited statements from Casey and Stenberg that Roe v. Wade should be upheld, stating that judges should not inject personal affinities into decisions of law, and that, “abortion, as a right granted by the Supreme Court, is unassailable as precedent unless or until overturned by the Supreme Court’.
Judge Luttig spoke in a panel discussion during the 2003 convention of the American Constitution Society (FYI - a liberal policy organization whose arch enemy is The Federalist Society) on judicial activism. In which Judge Luttig defined activism as "the substitution of a judge's personal predelictions for law, whatever form that substitution takes." He then spoke out strongly against "activism" by judges of all stripes: "...it should not matter to either jurist [conservative or liberal], that his activism is employed in moderation. The conservative and liberal jurist alike should regard activism in moderation as no more defensible than activism in excess, the attempted defense of such as folly." He closed by saying, “I think we risk that when, after vicious confirmation hearings in which these labels are thrown around without definition, we risk that the judicial employee, regardless of their conscientiousness, will fall into the belief that he or she should vote a particular way, because that is the political platform of the appointing president. And when that occurs, there will, indeed, be no difference... between politics and law."
A hint at Judge Luttig’s independent streak that, consistent with his judicial philosophy, might not make him attractive to any hyper-politicized folks in the Bush administration, and subject to a venomous and acerbic confirmation fight to the post of Supreme Court Justice. Here, he's hoping get that chance. I can’t believe they actually say these things.
http://jmluttig.blogspot.com/
Monday, October 03, 2005
HAIRY-ETTE: ALL EYELINER, NO JURISPRUDENCE
Every hour that goes by, the more depressed I get. It's not that I'm mad about not being appointed to the Supreme Court. (I mean, I am, but this is much bigger than that.) It's that the President of the United States, whom at this point I wouldn't allow one of my clerks to hire as a manual laborer, had to choose such a sycophantic lightweight to fill what would have been my seat. The only possible distinction that Hairy-Ette might hold is she's the first Supreme Court nominee whose eyeliner is thicker than her curriculum vitae.
Samuel Alito
Judge Alito was the sole dissenter on the Third Circuit in “Planned Parenthood v. Casey”, wisely struck down a Pennsylvania law that required women seeking abortions to consult their husbands. His case: That a majority of probable reasons for an abortion (economic constraints, future plans, the husbands' previously expressed opposition, etc) may prevent and “make unnecessary” through ‘talking it out” an abortion." What if SHE decided she didn’t want the bay? What if the husband was abusive and was using a ‘forced’ pregnancy to keep the wife a salve and victim of that marriage. The case went on to the Supreme Court, and the lower upheld the court's decision 6 to 3.
Lawrence Lustberg, a New Jersey criminal defense lawyer who has tried numerous cases before Judge Alito on the Third Circuit since 1981, describes him as "an activist conservatist judge" who narrowly construes prisoners' and criminals' rights and is "very prosecutorial from the bench.” “He has looked to be creative in his conservatism, which is, I think, as much a Rehnquist as a Scalia trait," Lustberg says.
"Scalito" as he is regarded, for his views resembling those of conservative Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, Judge Samuel Alito Jr. also appears to not know what is appropriate behavior for a Federal Judge, much less Supreme Court Associate Justice. Lucky for us he writes a regular blog. http://samuelalito.blogspot.com/ You have to read this. It is frightening, his lack of discretion or apparent lack of concern for perception of his personal judgment.
A favorite son of the political right, weith strong ties to former Republican administrations, Judge Alito was appointed in 1990 by George H.W. Bush to the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, Judge Alito has been in frequent, vocal dissent in a court that has been historically liberal.
Priscilla Owen
Judge Owen’s steadfast conservative legal opinions mirror her, inarguable judicial activism (even by Judge Owen herself, on numerous occasions) that falls outside the mainstream and out at grave risk the continued vigorous enforcement of constitutional and legal rights in the areas of civil rights and civil liberties. Owen too often used the power of the bench to promote her own ultra-conservative, pro-corporate views. Owen was out of the mainstream, even by Texas standards
Supporters called Judge Owen a no-nonsense, "consistent conservative" with long experience as a state-court judge. Opponents criticize her conservative positions on red hot social and economic issues, her pro-corporate and her pro-life posture.
On July 23, 2002, the Senate Judiciary Committee held its first hearing on Priscilla Owen. Attended by most members of the Committee, this day-long hearing allowed for an exhaustive review Judge Owen’s record and allowed her numerous opportunities to clarify her record and/or opportunity to rebut the allegations being made about her judicial activism. Unable to satisfy the Committee that she would not be a judicial activist, and her nomination was voted down by the Committee on September 5, 2002
Senators rejected Owen for appointment to the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit because of her record as an activist Texas Supreme Court justice who repeatedly ruled against reproductive rights, open government, environmental protection and workers and consumers.
In a series of cases beginning in 2000, Justice Owen and the Texas Supreme Court had to interpret a Texas statute that allowed young women to obtain a judicial bypass rather than notifying their parents that they intended to exercise their right to choose legal abortion. In these “Jane Doe” cases, repeatedly the Texas high court rejected one of many attempts by Owen to prevent a young woman from obtaining an abortion by placing insurmountable hurdles between young women and their constitutional right to choose, hurdles that could not and cannot be justified, causing one of the justices, who formed the majority, to explicitly denounce Owen's effort to thwart the clear intent of the law, declaring (in a very Owen-esque tone) her actions as "an unconscionable act of judicial activism."
The Texas justice who identified Owen as a radical jurist, US Attorney General Alberto Gonzales finds himself. Gonzales argued, in another example, that one of Owen's positions taken in dissent would "judicially amend" a statute for the benefit of manufacturers selling defective products. On abortion, Democrats criticized Owen for consistenly voting against judicial overrides of Texas's parental-notification abortion law. On a court with nine Republican appointees,
Although Owen has not had occasion as a judge to interpret Roe or Casey, her judicial activism in the Jane Doe cases is strongly predictive of a judge who would draw sharp limits on the protection to the right to choose afforded by Roe as reaffirmed in Casey. The Casey "undue burden" standard allows significant discretion from lower court judges in determining when a restriction on access to abortion is constitutional. It is clear from the Jane Doe cases that Owen would use this discretion to continue to chip away at women's reproductive rights
Owen's parental notification opinions show a willingness to use judicial activism to rewrite statutes she finds unappealing. Her abortion dissents have been characterized as "inflammatory and irresponsible rhetoric" and she has been chastised by her own colleagues on the conservative Texas Supreme Court for "impos[ing her] own personal convictions into what must be a strictly legal inquiry." Her nomination must continue to be rejected by the Senate.
