Posted on 10/06/2005 7:59:11 PM PDT by nunya bidness
Statement on the Nomination of Harriet Miers to the U.S. Supreme Court
WASHINGTON (October 4, 2005) -- The following statement can be attributed to David N. O'Steen, executive director of the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC):
"President Bush has an excellent record of appointing judges who recognize the proper role of the courts, which is to interpret the law according to its actual text, and not to legislate from the bench. We believe that Harriet Miers is another nominee who will abide by the text and history of the Constitution."
According to published reports, Harriet Miers has been active since about 1980 in the Valley View Christian Church in Dallas.
According to material posted this week on the internet by Marvin Olasky (editor of World magazine), Nathan Hecht, a Republican member of the Texas Supreme Court, is an elder at the same church, and has been a close friend of Miers for decades. Hecht told Olasky "her personal views are consistent with that of evangelical Christians."
Hecht also said that he and Miers "went to two or three prolife dinners in the late 80s or early 90s."
In 1989, according to various press accounts, Miers donated $150 to Texans United for Life, a Dallas-based pro-life group, and she was listed as a "bronze patron" in the group's dinner program.
On October 4, 2005, the Dallas Morning News published a story based on an interview with Lorlee Bartos, who was Miers' campaign manager in 1989 when Miers ran, successfully, for an at-large seat on the Dallas City Council. The story reported that the two women discussed abortion once during that period, and quotes Bartos as saying, "She is on the extreme end of the anti-choice movement," and, "I think Harriet's belief was pretty strongly felt. I suspect she is of the same cloth as the president."
In 1993, when Miers was the president of the Texas State Bar, she helped lead an unsuccessful effort to rescind a pro-abortion stance taken by the American Bar Association in favor of a neutral position. Leonard Leo, executive vice president of the conservative Federalist Society, said, "The ABA is a place where there was an awful lot of liberal activism, so it took some courage for a woman to take the position she did." On October 4, 2005, the New York Times ran a story about Mier's role in the ABA fight, under the headline "Miers Was Leader in Effort Within Bar to Rescind Support for Abortion."
Some commentary on the current nomination incorporates incorrect information or assumptions about the legal status quo on abortion. On September 14, 2005, the Los Angeles Times published an eye-opening examination, written by its veteran Supreme Court reporter, on the true scope of the "right to abortion" created by the Supreme Court in Roe v. Wade and more recent rulings, which are still often badly misunderstood. (It is here.) The article also summarizes documents that reveal the internal processes at the Supreme Court that produced Roe v. Wade in 1973.
Among currently sitting Supreme Court justices, six (including Sandra Day O'Connor) have voted in favor of Roe v. Wade -- that is, in support of the doctrine that abortion must be allowed for any reason until "viability" (about five and one-half months), and for "health" reasons (broadly defined) even during the final three months of pregnancy. Two justices (Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas) have voted to overturn Roe, and one (John Roberts) has not voted on the matter.
A refutation of the myth that the Supreme Court has been divided 5 to 4 on Roe v. Wade, issued by the Annenberg Center's FactCheck.org, is posted here: http://www.factcheck.org/article176.html
However, regarding the permissibility of a meaningful ban on partial-birth abortion, the current Court is split 5-3 in favor of partial-birth abortion (not counting Chief Justice Roberts, who has not voted on the issue). In 2000, Justice O'Connor voted to say that Roe v. Wade prevented bans on partial-birth abortion. (Stenberg v. Carhart, 2000) On September 23, the Bush Administration's Solicitor General asked the Supreme Court to accept for review, this term, a lower-court ruling that struck down the federal Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act. The Solicitor General's petition is posted here.
On November 30, 2005, the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in Ayotte v. Planned Parenthood of Northern New England, a case which will determine whether states can continue to require that a parent be notified before an abortion is performed on a minor daughter. Some observers believe that the case may be decided on a 5-4 vote, one way or the other.
National Right to Life is the nation's largest pro-life organization, with 50 state affiliates and approximately 3,000 local affiliates nationwide. NRLC works through legislation and education to protect those threatened by abortion, infanticide, euthanasia, and assisted suicide.
Popular sentiment among those who disagree with Miers' nomination is that the President is a coward. One even suggested the President was corrupt.
These are our people talking.
The RINOs in the Senate are responsible for this situation. If we had pulled the trigger back then, we'd have a clear field for getting a known conservative justice confirmed right now. Instead we have to entice the Democrats to filibuster Miers so we can put the pressure on the RINOs to vote for a rule change to end the filibuster on Presidential nominees, so that the next conservative nominee to the Supreme Court will have a chance at confirmation even if we don't get a 2/3 majority in the Senate next year.
You're a very smart person.
That's some classic stuff. And a bit sobering.
This is why I don't trust Bush on this. A person will do or say anything if they have even a shot in the dark at the Supreme Court. She could have been giving the President a bucket of "what would you like to hear" for the last few years knowing that this moment could arise. This is a mistake for the chance it is taking. Millions of lives depend on it.
If there were enough votes to push the "Nuclear Option" then we would have done it. We threatened to do it because all we could do was threaten.
Seeing the "Nuclear Option" fail would have been disastrous. You should be thankful a face saving out was found by 7 RINOs.
That is of course my point.
Thank you for posting these articles. Can you tell me how you found them? Lexus/Nexus maybe?
I had no idea that Reagan had been utterly fooled. I had assumed few conservative female judges could be found in the 80's and Reagan chose the best he could.
The difference between Reagan and Dubya is Dubya can't be duped by advisors he trusts. He knows Miers well. It is also interesting to note that Reagan had only been in office for 6 months before having to pick O'Connor from a pool of far fewer credible women candidates. During the Oct 3rd debate Gore said "the next president is going to appoint three and maybe even four justices of the Supreme Court." Dubya has had a long time to decide on Miers.
Dubya made this choice a long time ago. It is suprising that it took almost 5 years before he got his first pick. Miers was carefully scutinized before her nomination was announced.
Dubya knows how Miers will vote. I trust Dubya wanted another conservative on the SCOTUS. I can't wait for the next court session.
The had been posted here yesterday. Not sure where they got them from, but assume it is lexis/nexis.
I'd really like to get a subscription there one day.
I'm smarter. We don't need to draw a filibuster.
We can discredit the filibuster if Miers is confirmed by a combination of both pubbies and dimwits. The dimwits have been justifying the filibuster by claiming that the majority pubbies will just toe the party line and impose their 55 vote majority without any concern whatsoever of the minority viewpoint. If both pubbies and dimwits combine to confirm Miers, as they did with Roberts, the filibuster is entirely discredited, regardless of just how many votes give her the majortity nod.
All this turmoil works to our benefit.
Well then we agree Friend, and forgive me for not recognizing it.
I think your tagline is marvelous.
Didja vote for Bush? Didja trust him when you did? And now you don't? Then let me ask you this...if you were the president and you had to go to war in the Senate over a SCOTUS nominee, would you do it with the GOP senators that are there now? McCain, Collins, Graham, Snow, Chaffee, etc. That's why Bush didn't pick a "known" entity with a clear papertrail. It could have very well been a losing proposition.
This woman will be a fine Associate Justice. And those complaining right now are more interested in winning a fight with the Democrats than getting "strict constructionists" on the court. Unfortunately, with the bunch we have in the Senate there's little guarantee of winning any fight. Bush knows this and that's why he's chosen this path.
These morons would do well to realize the president is not the enemy. The Democrats are and right now these fools are doing the Democrats' dirty work.
Just because I don't agree with some of my Pub friends on this (like yourself) doesn't mean we are "morons".
I see those who are siding with the President on this as cut from the same cloth as the compromising 14 in the Senate. Those of us who are opposed to the Pres. taking chances with this nomination are cut from the cloth of Scalia and Thomas. We don't compromise. We fight the good fight.
Another point that everyone seems to gloss over in their "moderate, compromising spirit" these past few days is the damage that The President has done to the organizations and Justices that have been unabashedly speaking out these last 35-40 years. What has been their message for all these years? Constitutional conservatives should and could be on the Supreme Court. Well they just got the answer with the last two appointments. "If your a constructionist, a conservative, you'd better keep your mouth shut or your not eligible for the highest court in the land.
This is going to change the outspoken constructionist of the past into a quiet, hide in the shadows individual in the future. When that happens, it will become more unaccepted by the day to even be a constructionist much less talk about it.
I didn't call you a moron. Go back and reread what I wrote. I'm referring to a handful of self-absorbed, self-righteous, self-appointed leaders of conservative Republicans--like Ann Coulter, Bill Kristol, Pat Buchanan, et.al.--who, because the president didn't come worship at their high-priestess alter of importance, have decided to divide the party while Democrats sit back and watch the self-destruction. This is the same crap Pat Buchanan pulled in 1992 that got us eight years of Bill Clinton. BTW he's the same "moron" who ran against Bush as a Reform Party candidate.
Bill Kristol has never really been a "friend" of this administration since he was a McCain guy in 2000. He's railed against Bush's handling of the Iraq war--among other things--and wasn't even a supporter of it in the first place. Now he shows up on the Today Show to badmouth the president's pick and it never dawns on him that the last time he was on that show was the last time he badmouthed the president. Imagine that. Too bad he hasn't...or, hmmm, perhaps he has.
It seems to me that what's going on here is a power grab for control of the GOP. It's just started earlier than usual. Bush is out in two and half years and the ultra-conservatives are moving to the forefront. This nomination was simply the vehicle in which to do so. But the problem with ultra-conservatives is they don't realize their agenda is in many ways just as distasteful to centrist Americans as the ultra-liberal agenda is. I'm not saying centrist Americans are correct in that belief, only that that belief exists, primarily due to the MSM constanting spinning against that agenda.
Look, Republicans always seem to get into this mode of p!ssing on each other and losing focus on who the real enemy is. Now they're doing it again. Meanwhile the Democrats are content to sit idly by and watch the fun.
I don't agree with you on this issue but I didn't call you a moron. I did however refer to the people pushing this as morons and will continue to. My point is this: it serves no useful purpose for the GOP to air its' laundry in public. However, there is a reason why some individuals have chosen to do so and it would behoove you and others to ask yourselves, "Why?" I'm thinking there's more to it than simply wanting a well-established, in-your face conservative nominee crammed down the throats of the senate Democrats. Particularly since the end result may very well be getting a not-so-well-established, not-so-in-your-face, but-still-a-very conservative nominee actually get confirmed and seated on the bench.
Think about it. Sometimes the truth is in what isn't said. As far as I'm concerned this is a shell game on the part of these "morons".
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