Posted on 10/09/2005 9:10:09 AM PDT by Crackingham
In an interview set for broadcast on Monday, leading conservative Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia appears to be defending Harriet Miers against critics who say she doesn't have the qualifications to sit on the High Court.
"I think it's a good thing to have people from all sorts of backgrounds [on the Court]," Scalia tells CNBC's Maria Bartiromo, as the debate rages over Miers' lack of judical experience.
Without mentioning the Bush nominee by name, the conservative legal icon said that the High Court needed someone who had never served as a judge to take the place of the late Chief Justice William Rehnquist.
"There is now nobody with that [non judicial] background after the death of the previous chief," Scalia laments to Bartiromo.
"And the reason that's happened, I think, is that the nomination and confirmation process has become so controversial, so politicized that I think a president does not want to give the opposition an easy excuse [to say] 'Well, this person has no judicial experience.'" Scalia concludes: "I don't think that's a good thing. I think the Byron Whites, the Lewis Powells and the Bill Rehnquists have contributed to the court even though they didn't sit on a lower federal court."
Bush lied to his supporters again. Nothing new to see here. Move along.
How can you disagree with a decision BEFORE it's made?
So will the Republicans.
Funny, I don't remember that being the theme a year ago today, when we were being promised a Thomas or Scalia, instead of a "trust me" crony.
Trusting politicians is for the feeble-minded and Russians.
A simple, dishonest, impertinent question that has NOTHING to do with the point I was making---that Scalia himself was trying to look like he was endorsing Miers without explicitly doing so. It doesn't make the least difference to my point if any other Justice has commented on a nominee, and I made no such claim that any had. Hence your question was consciously impertinent and misleading. Just like your claims about when you became a member here.
You can't do it and won't admit it so you blather one.
You've as much as admitted you distorted my original post---sputtering about what I won't "admit" is besides the point.
But the point of my post, in response to jdm, was that she was also nominated to restore some nonjudicial experience to the Supreme Court, a role that Rehnquist had filled before.
How can you not live in the real world and deal with facts AS THEY ARE?
Disregarding the debate over whether Harriet Miers is qualified to sit on the Supreme Court, is her nomination all about politics or not?
The other thing that they don't seem to understand is that, like a child having a temper tantrum, being left along with your own screaming is not a sign of victory...it is a sign of abandonment. I'm not going to change my mind and they are not going to change their mind...so my solution is to just wander off and wait till it's over and we can go back to rational discussion.
I was absolutely not thrilled with Miers. However, I will wait until I see her confirmation hearings to make a decision. Most of the criticism of her is hysterical assumption...and that includes the "super genius" pundits.
Some days, I wonder where all the grown ups have gone. One can say they agree, disagree or want to wait and see...but standing around yelling epithets at each other is silly and demeans otherwise rational debate. My children deal with disagreements more maturely than this.
Wrong. He is saying there needs to be another non-judge on the Court because since Rehnquist's death, the Court has lost that.
Roberts was a judge. He obviously is not talking about Roberts.
"Scalia also declined to comment on Bush's nomination of the inexperienced Harriet Miers to replace the retiring Sandra Day O'Connor on the court.
"Never having met her, I have no impression of her," Scalia said of the president's lawyer."
http://www.nypost.com/news/nationalnews/55057.htm
The President made his decision and you can't change that. Knowing Bush there is virtually no chance that he will relent.
The number one criteria in my book is that their voting record, once on the Court, much more closely matches that of Scalia and Thomas than it does that of Ginsberg or Stevens.
I will compromise on everything else, if I get that. If I don't get that, then nothing else will be an adequate substitute.
LOL! I feel a little better now! I knew I couldn't be the only person to misinterpret that ONE sentence!
You are one divisive newcomer, aren't you? You'll twist the knife, regardless who placed it ...
Roberts was a judge before coming to the Court.
His comment is not specifically about Miers at all.
HOWEVER, it does address the nomination because Scalia gives his support to the idea that there needs to be a non-judge to give that perspective to the Court.
Roberts was not a non-judge. He is not saying someone has to take Scalia's specific place on the Court literally and be a non-judge to do so.
He is saying that it would be great to have a non-judge somewhere on the Court because since Scalia's death, there are no non-judges.
This isn't exactly hard to understand here what he is saying folks.
Compare the "resumes" of the other SCOTUS judges that hadn't previous served as judge to Miers resume. Examples:
Louis Brandeis
Entered Harvard, graduating from its law school in 1877 at the head of his class.
Most successful attorney of his day in Boston, achieving financial success and taking an active role in progressive causes.
In the 1908 case Muller v. Oregon, Brandeis, acting as a litigator, established what became known as the "Brandeis Brief", the first instance in the United States that social science had been used in law and changed the direction of the Supreme Court and of U.S. law. The Brandeis Brief became the model for future Supreme Court presentations.
Felix Frankfurter
Graduated from City College of New York.
Received law license from Harvard Law School in 1902
Named assistant of New York attorney Henry Stimson, and continued when Stimson was named Secretary of War Helped found the American Civil Liberties Union in 1920
Provided legal research for the the case Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti
Published major law books including The Business of the Supreme Court (1927), Justice Holmes and the Supreme Court (1938), The Case of Sacco and Vanzetti (1954) and Felix Frankfurter Reminisces (1960).
Contempories considered him the nation's preeminent scholar on labor law
From 1914 onward, popular professor at Harvard Law School.
Lewis Powell
Attended Washington and Lee University, garnering both an undergraduate and a law degree from that university, and elected president of student body as an undergraduate.
Attended Harvard Law School for a master's degree.
Rose to the rank of Colonel in World War II, working in intelligence and decoding.
Partner for over a quarter of a century at Hunton, Williams, Gay, Powell and Gibson, one of the largest law firms in Virginia.
From 1952 to 1961, he was Chairman of the Richmond School Board. Powell presided over the school board at a time during the turmoilous time when the the State of Virginia was locked in a fight over Brown v. Board of Education. The Richmond School Board had no authority at the time to force integration.
Served as President of the American Bar Association during the year 1964-1965. Involved in the development of Colonial Williamsburg, where he was both a trustee and general counsel.
In 1971, he wrote the famous Powell Memorandum to a friend at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. The memo may have sparked the formation of one or more influential conservative think tanks.
William H. Rehnquist
Attended Kenyon College for one quarter in the fall of 1942, before entering the U.S. Army Air Force
After the war ended, Rehnquist attended Stanford University with assistance under the provisions of the G.I. Bill.
In 1948, he received a bachelor's degree and a master's degree in political science.
In 1950, he went to Harvard University, where he received a master's degree in government.
Rehnquist graduated first in his class, probably based on the fact that Rehnquist was class valedictorian during graduation ceremonies.
Worked as a law clerk for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Robert H. Jackson from 1951–1952
Served as a legal advisor to Barry Goldwater's 1964 presidential campaign.
Served as Assistant Attorney General of the United States from 1969 to 1971.
Headed the U.S. Justice Dept. Office of Legal Counsel
Served as the chief lawyer to Attorney General John Mitchell
Harriet Miers
Graduated from Southern Methodist University with her bachelor's degree in mathematics (1967) and a Juris Doctor degree (1970)
Cerked for Belli, Ashe, Ellison, Choulos & Lieff in the summer of 1969
Worked in private practice for the Dallas firm of Locke, Liddell & Sapp (and predecessor firms prior to mergers) from 1972 until 2001.
In 1989, she was elected to one two-year term as an at-large member on the Dallas City Council; she declined to run for reelection in 1991
In 1995, George W. Bush, then Texas governor, appointed Miers to chair the Texas Lottery Commission.
In November 2004, President George W. Bush named her to succeed Alberto Gonzales to the post of White House Counsel
I was wondering the same thing.
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