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Justice Samuel Alito was the featured keynote speaker at the American Spectator’s annual Robert L. Bartley dinner at Washington’s Mandarin Oriental hotel last night. Along with taking a crack at the new vice-president elect (h/t Politico), he also joked about the famous 2008 Obama campaign mantra of “Hope and Change.” (Eyeblast.tv has the audio uploaded here:)

In what may turn out to be the most important Second Amendment ruling since 1939’s hideously misinterpreted Miller - and maybe the most important ruling on the Amendment in American history, the Supreme Court has granted cert to Parker v. D.C. and will be taking up the case in this session. Natch, Glenn Reynolds has tonsalinks. My first take (I have to admit I’m shaking in my boots at the negative possibilities here, given that I thought the SCOTUS would dodge this one) is that the Court will find an individual right, but do so in such a way that...

After calling John G. Roberts Jr. two years ago last month to ask him to serve on the Supreme Court, President Bush hung up and told aides, "I just offered the job to a great, smart, 50-year-old lawyer." The emphasis, of course, was on "50-year-old" -- Bush's way of saying he had just made a choice that would help shape the Supreme Court for three or four decades to come. Or so he thought. Roberts's seizure during a Maine vacation this week may not mean anything in terms of his longevity on the court but it certainly offered a reminder...

PRESIDENTIAL NEWS OF THE DAY: President and Mrs. Bush are spending the weekend at their ranch in Crawford, TX. They will return to Washington on time for President Bush to participate in the swearing-in of new Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke at the U.S. central bank in Washington. The Fed said in a statement that the ceremony was scheduled for 10 a.m. (1500 GMT). Mr. Bernanke's acceptance remarks will be his first public comments since he took office. Former Chairman Alan Greenspan, members of Congress and the cabinet, and agency officials were among the invited guests, the Fed said. Fed...

Congratulations, Sam Alito! And congratulations, U.S.A.: It now looks like we have four out of nine justices who will not legislate from the bench. But we still have a structural problem in our federal judiciary, one that is hard to solve. For anyone who believes in our natural tendency toward sin, the Supreme Court has always been a troubling institution. The anti-federalist New York Journal complained in 1788, during the debate about whether to ratify the Constitution, that some justices would twist the law as they saw fit: "They will not confine themselves to any fixed or established rules." The...

Last February, as rumors swirled about the failing health of Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, a team of conservative grass-roots organizers, public relations specialists and legal strategists met to prepare a battle plan to ensure any vacancies were filled by like-minded jurists. The team recruited conservative lawyers to study the records of 18 potential nominees — including Judges John G. Roberts Jr. and Samuel A. Alito Jr. — and trained more than three dozen lawyers across the country to respond to news reports on the president's eventual pick. "We boxed them in," one lawyer present during the strategy meetings said...

WITH SAMUEL ALITO ABOUT to be confirmed, it's time to take stock of this particular episode in the making of a justice, the nation's 110th. Bear in mind that Alito was not President Bush's first choice to succeed Sandra Day O'Connor. The estimable John Roberts was, but when Chief Justice William Rehnquist died, Bush decided to redesignate Roberts for the center seat. That meant finding another nominee for O'Connor's seat.As it happened, Bush surprised the world by naming White House Counsel Harriet Miers. The Miers nomination proved a major blunder. Bush had opted for a person he knew well who...

WASHINGTON - Senate GOP leaders plan to confirm Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito early next week after dealing with a filibuster threat from Democratic die-hards who worry that the conservative judge would swing the court too far to the right.A final vote making the New Jersey jurist the nation’s 110th Supreme Court justice was scheduled for Tuesday morning, only hours before President Bush begins his State of the Union address to Congress and the nation, if Alito’s bipartisan supporters succeed in rounding up 60 votes to cut off debate on Monday.<SNIP>A Democratic senator who plans to vote against Alito’s confirmation,...

Only days separate Sam Alito from being confirmed as the next Supreme Court Justice. (YEA!) Many years ago a nominee of his caliber, with his knowledge and respect for the constitution and the rule of law, would have been graciously welcomed by both sides. In today’s political climate however, the very thought of his presence on the court has one side of the political arm so seething mad, they're beside themselves. Why? You see, for decades the majority of members on the court reflected a corrupt understanding of the founder’s intent. This led to numerous misinterpretations of the law and...

Contact: Press Office 202-863-8614  “To even suggest a filibuster against a nominee as qualified as Judge Alito reflects a philosophy so out of touch that it’s bordering on reckless. The judicial confirmation process, particularly one for the nation’s highest court, should be insulated from such thoughtless bomb throwing in an effort to remain relevant. One can't help but wonder if the consummate candidate was for Judge Alito, before he was against him.”-Tracey Schmitt, RNC Press Secretary SEN. JOHN KERRY (D-MA) CALLS IN ALITO FILIBUSTER FROM SWITZERLAND“Sen. John Kerry Has Decided To Support A Filibuster To Block The Nomination Of Judge Samuel...

(Washington - AP) — US Senator Jim Jeffords says he will oppose the nomination of Samuel Alito to the US Supreme Court. Jeffords says that while he believes Alito is qualified to serve on the court, he does not believe the country would be served by his judicial philosophy. The independent senator says that he does not believe Alito fully appreciates the limits on the power of the presidency.

Salazar's Splutterings [Wendy Long 01/26 12:18 PM] Ken Salazar, who has been completely neutered as a political force by his own scheming, twisting, waffling, and blowing whatever way he wrongly thinks a political wind might be blowing, is obviously frustrated. What would be the metaphor? Neutered cat trapped in corner? Never mind.... Salazar is stuck. He can't filibuster Judge Alito, because that would be political suicide with the great majority of Colorado voters who, like the great majority of Americans, want Senators to do their jobs and vote on judicial nominees. But, unfortunately for him, he chose to make his...

Senator Joe Biden (D-Del.) believes Senate confirmation hearings for Supreme Court nominees should be abandoned. Biden says the humiliation he and other Democrats suffered at the hands of Roberts and Alito have left him feeling depressed. “These judges are really smart,” complained Biden. “We can’t fake ‘em or shake ‘em. We’re wasting everyone’s time.” Biden told NBC's "Today" show he’d like to see a system wherein the nominee is tied up in a sack and each senator is allowed one whack with a baseball bat. “This would play to our strengths,” said Biden. “If the nominee survives, he gets to...

Judge Samuel Alito Jr., whose entire history suggests that he holds extreme views about the expansive powers of the presidency and the limited role of Congress, will almost certainly be a Supreme Court justice soon. His elevation will come courtesy of a president whose grandiose vision of his own powers threatens to undermine the nation's basic philosophy of government — and a Senate that seems eager to cooperate by rolling over and playing dead.It is hard to imagine a moment when it would be more appropriate for senators to fight for a principle. Even a losing battle would draw the...

WASHINGTON - Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito won commitments from a majority of senators Tuesday, assuring his eventual confirmation and making a rightward tilt of the court likely.  On the same day Alito won a 10-8 party-line approval from the Senate Judiciary Committee, five Republicans announced that they would vote for his confirmation in the full Senate, pushing him over 50 votes in the 100-member chamber. Fifty Senate Republicans, plus one Democrat, Ben Nelson of Nebraska, have publicly committed to vote for Alito through their representatives, interviews with The Associated Press or news releases. No Republicans have opposed him and...

WASHINGTON - Sen. Rick Santorum's leading Democratic challenger, Pennsylvania Treasurer Bob Casey, announced Tuesday that he endorses Judge Samuel Alito's confirmation to the Supreme Court.For weeks, Republicans have called Casey "Silent Bob" and pressed him to say whether he supports Alito's confirmation. Casey and Alito have a family connection because Alito, who serves on the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals based in Philadelphia, sided with Casey's father, the late Gov. Bob Casey, in Planned Parenthood v. Casey. The case challenged a state law requiring women seeking abortions to notify their spouses."I do not agree with everything that Judge Samuel...

From Fox News' "Fox News Live" January 24, 2006Former DNC Chairman, Governor Ed Rendell [D-PA]: "I Believe He's A Qualified Judge. He Sits On The Third Circuit Court Of Appeals In Philadelphia. I Don't Know If You Know This ... My Wife Is A Third Circuit Court Judge."Fox News' Bill Hemmer: "I'm Aware Of That, And Your History In Philadelphia Should Give You Pretty Good Knowledge Of Him."Rendell: "Right. She Has A High Opinion Of His Integrity And His Academic Standards. She Disagrees With Him On A Number Of Cases And Agrees With Him On Some. I Disagree With A...

Now that the confirmation hearings for Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito are over, what did we learn? That a nominee for the high court won’t answer questions he’s not supposed to answer? Or that liberals will then use those non-answers as a public rationale for opposition? We did learn (again) that televised Senate Judiciary Committee hearings featuring the questioning of a nominee have outlived their usefulness, if such usefulness ever truly existed. We also learned (again) what the left values and opposes in a judicial nominee. We learned that they hold results to be more important than old fashioned notions...

Sam Alito gets his first of two votes today, by the Senate Judiciary Committee to be followed later this week by the full Senate, and Mr. Alito can be excused if he thinks of these as his victory laps. The Democrats have not given up; somewhere in a basement in Washington aides are concocting further horror stories for their bosses to spring on the public today, tomorrow or the next day.

If Judge Samuel Alito Jr.'s confirmation hearings lacked drama, apart from his wife's bizarrely over-covered crying jag, it is because they confirmed the obvious. Judge Alito is exactly the kind of legal thinker President Bush wants on the Supreme Court. He has a radically broad view of the president's power, and a radically narrow view of Congress's power. He has long argued that the Constitution does not protect abortion rights. He wants to reduce the rights and liberties of ordinary Americans, and has a history of tilting the scales of justice against the little guy. As senators prepare to vote...

The year is 2009. President Hillary Clinton introduces a nationalized healthcare package, which she assembled after conducting a dozen secret meetings in the White House with George Soros, Big Labor, and unknown representatives from industry groups who stand to make a bundle. Judicial Watch files a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit for the minutes of the meetings. Clinton refuses, citing her Executive Privilege to hold private and confidential conversations about most anything she chooses. The case goes to the Supreme Court. How would Samuel Alito vote? President Al Gore, in a major speech on "the terrorism of child pornography," orders...

The Senate confirmation hearings for Judge Samuel Alito told us more about the Senators than it did about Judge Alito.First, there were those long-winded preambles to "questions" for the judge. Then there were the Mickey Mouse maneuvers and insinuations, spiced here and there with outright lies.The ridiculousness of the charges was classically illustrated by Senator Joseph Biden's claim that Alito had been part of a group that was trying to keep minorities and women out of Princeton. Apparently wanting everyone to meet the same admissions standards is considered to be the same as being against minorities and women.To dramatize his...

ABOUT THE ALITO HEARINGS, one thing is certain: If it had been the Concerned Alumni of Princeton that was up for confirmation, the nomination wouldn't even make it out of the Judiciary Committee. Democrats led by Sen. Edward Kennedy portrayed CAP as hostile to minorities and to coeducation and thus to women. And Republicans weren't about to get into a fight over CAP, which was formed in 1972, shortly after Princeton went coeducational and the same year Samuel Alito graduated. CAP went out of business in 1986.CAP drew the interest of committee Democrats because Alito once identified himself as a...

Those who hold hands with the future at night and relay their divinations tell us that Judge Alito will be OK'd by the Senate Judiciary Committee by a party vote. Some reach even further and predict that he will be confirmed by a party vote, but that there might be a little maneuvering on the floor in the matter of a filibuster.One is told not to expect a filibuster because it is a weapon of last resort, and weapons of last resort should be kept for last-resort use. Several times, in the recent past, the question has been raised whether...

 Ladies and gentlemen, Democrats of the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, welcome to this introductory tour of the North American federalist in his natural habitat. We hope that by getting to know the 10-toed American federalist a bit better this afternoon, you'll avoid, in the future, some of the errors and missteps that have thus far plagued your efforts to understand, question, and possibly impugn them at confirmation hearings. Sen. Feinstein, please do try to keep up with the tour. We ask that you listen carefully as we debunk some of the stereotypes and myths you may have heard about...

Forget Sam Alito's tenuous ties, two decades ago, to the Concerned Alumni of Princeton. Where's the outrage about Sen. Edward Kennedy's continuing membership in the Owl Club? Kennedy relentlessly badgered Judge Alito for listing the Princeton group on a job application in 1985, but The Washington Times reported Thursday that the Massachusetts senator remains active with the Owl - one of nine males-only fraternities that in 1984 Harvard "booted from the university for violating federal anti-discrimination laws, authored by Mr. Kennedy." TheNew York Times examined the records of CAP and found no evidence Alito was an active member. Yet the...

This is U.S. Appeals Court Judge Maryanne Trump Barry, a Clinton appointee who gave a glowing endorsement of her colleague, Sam Alito, earlier today, along with six other judges from the appeals court who appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee to support Alito. Chuck Schumer walked out before the judges started to speak. Teddy Kennedy showed up late, stayed for 10 minutes, then left. Pat Leahy put on a dour face for a short time, and also bailed... if Judge Barry were a screeching liberal moaning about Alito's threat to the female populace, the Dems would have been all ears--and...

Samuel Alito's nomination to the Supreme Court represents a grave threat to our fundamental liberties. His record makes it clear that he is a conservative activist who will put his personal ideology above the rule of law.If Alito replaces Sandra Day O'Connor, a moderate justice who represented the swing vote in many cases, some of our most fundamental rights are at risk. Alito won't stand up to a president's abuse of power. He has said that the Constitution does not protect a woman's right to choose. And he has consistently used the bench as a launching pad for his conservative...

Samuel Alito Jr. wrote a memo in 1985 arguing there is no constitutional right to abortion, and pro-choice groups are alarmed by that document. They say it proves he's a right-wing extremist with a "long history of hostility to reproductive freedom," in the words of the National Abortion Federation.Maybe Alito is secretly plotting to make pregnancy mandatory for all fertile females, as the NAF sugests. But for those of us who are inclined to be charitable, there's another possible explanation for why he said the Constitution doesn't protection abortion rights: because it doesn't.It's true the Supreme Court has ruled it...

Ted Kennedy threw a tantrum yesterday. In the middle of the second day of the Judiciary Committee’s questioning of Judge Samuel Alito, Kennedy demanded the committee go into an executive session to vote on subpoenaing the private papers of William Rusher, a founding member of the Concerned Alumni of Princeton (CAP), and then threatened to disrupt the committee proceedings by repeating the request over and over until it was recognized.Chairman Arlen Specter, clearly surprised and annoyed by Kennedy’s antics, put the Senior Senator from Massachusetts in his place: “Well, Senator Kennedy, I’m not concerned about your threats to have votes...

President Bush declared Oklahoma a major disaster area due to wildfires. In Louisville, Kentucky, he gave a speech on the global war on terror, particularly Iraq. Judge Alito's wife left her husband's Senate hearing in tears as a result of the collegial Democrat Senators' "questions" to her husband. Welcome to Sanity Island.

With the battle over the nomination of Judge Samuel A. Alito Jr. to the Supreme Court set to take center stage on Monday, the American people have undoubtedly become familiar in past weeks with his critics -- along with their criticisms, attacks and mischaracterizations. If the best predictor of future behavior is past performance, then it is reasonable to expect that a host of rather predictable, knee-jerk criticisms -- which have already been refuted with fact -- will be leveled against this fine nominee in a misguided effort to discredit his qualifications. As a preview of the coming debate, here...

Yes, Senator Kennedy is at it again. Not content with destroying Judge Bork 20 years ago, Senator Kennedy, the same senator whose lifelong boorishness and feckless behavior brought such grief to his family and to the Kopechnes, has decided to savage the reputation of yet another good man, Judge Samuel A. Alito. I don’t know how anyone can keep a straight face as this man denigrates another person. In case you have forgotten, while Judge Bork’s garbage was being stolen and analyzed by Kennedy operatives (a new federal law was later passed forbidding this vile practice), Senator Kennedy said the...

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) threatened yesterday to strip Democrats of the power to filibuster if they block the vote on Supreme Court nominee Samuel A. Alito Jr. "It would be against the intent of the Founding Fathers and our Constitution to deny Sam Alito an up-or-down vote on the floor of the United States Senate," he said on "Fox News Sunday." His willingness to consider a procedural maneuver called the "nuclear option" seemed somewhat premature. Last week, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) said that although he anticipates intense questioning of Alito during next month's hearings, he...

A POLITICAL sidebar that made surprising news the last few weeks is a phrase in a 1985 job application from now-Judge Sam Alito questioning the Warren Court's reapportionment decisions. That tidbit sent shock waves through the political and pundit classes. It shouldn't have. Justice-to-be Alito's statement wasn't an attack on equality, voting rights, or protecting victims of racial discrimination. It was a simple observation that a liberal court created a doctrine that, however salutary, has significant problems. Americans have long embraced the ideal of equality from ''all men are created equal" forward. Equality did not mean identical political influence in...

WASHINGTON, Dec. 5 - It is the time of year when bedtime stories and television specials often recall the plucky reindeer and the little girl of Whoville who managed to save Christmas. This year, some conservative groups are hoping to add a new name to that pantheon of heroes: Judge Samuel A. Alito Jr., the Supreme Court nominee. "Liberal groups like People for the American Way and the A.C.L.U. have opposed public Christmas and Hanukkah displays and even fought to keep Christmas carols out of school," declares a radio commercial paid for by the conservative Committee for Justice beginning Monday...

WASHINGTON -- Henry J. Friendly, who died in 1986, was perhaps the most distinguished American judge never to serve on the Supreme Court, and he almost spared the nation the poisonous consequences of that court's 1973 truncation of democratic debate about abortion policy. The story of that missed blessing was told recently by Judge A. Raymond Randolph of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, in an address to the Federalist Society. In 1970, Friendly, then on the Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit, was a member of a three-judge panel that heard the first abortion-rights case...

ALTHOUGH abortion rights have dominated the debate over the nomination of Judge Samuel A. Alito Jr. to the Supreme Court, there is another issue implicating the "culture of life" that has garnered fewer headlines: capital punishment. The impending executions of three men in California, including the lethal injection of reformed ex-gang leader Stanley Tookie Williams scheduled for Dec. 13, are a sober reminder of the irrevocable stakes in this area of law. Capital cases make up a substantial portion of the Supreme Court's docket each year. From 2000 to 2005, the court decided only three cases involving abortion but more...

When the confirmation hearings for Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito begin in January, much of the debate will focus on the issue of abortion. Alito has been nominated to replace Sandra Day O'Connor, one of the six justices who reliably voted to uphold Roe v. Wade. It's unfortunate that abortion will dominate so much of the discussion about Alito. It's unlikely that a case offering the opportunity to undo Roe will come before the Supreme Court any time soon, and even if it should, Alito's confirmation would put the unofficial Supreme Court abortion scorecard at 5-4, enough to keep Roe...

HOUSTON — The largest branch of North American Judaism voted on Sunday to oppose Samuel Alito's nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court. More than 2,000 delegates of the Union for Reform Judaism adopted a resolution saying Alito would "shift the ideological balance of the Supreme Court on matters of core concern to the reform movement" on abortion rights, women's rights, civil rights and the scope of federal power. The vote came at the closing session of the group's biennial convention, which was held in Houston Wednesday through Sunday. During a debate before the vote, Jeff Wasserstein, a former law clerk...

The writer, of Omaha, is Nebraska's junior U.S. senator.During his confirmation hearings, John Roberts said that judges should judge each case on its own merits. They need to weigh matters, not approach their work as ideological automatons.Those words were recounted in a Oct. 28 World-Herald editorial that recommended U.S. senators keep Roberts' considerations "firmly in mind" as they consider the next nominee to the U.S. Supreme Court and fulfill their obligation in considering appointees.With one successful and one unsuccessful Supreme Court nomination behind us, the Senate now is considering the nomination of Judge Samuel Alito to replace retiring Associate Justice...

A curious e-mail is making the rounds from Democratic Senator Ted Kennedy's communications director, Stephanie Cutter, attacking Judge Alito's response last week to the Senate Judiciary Committee's request for more information about Judge Alito's involvement in a case in Vanguard mutual funds was a party in name only. In Monga v. Ottenberg, a bankruptcy receiver sought to have a party's IRA assets (which included funds in a Vanguard account) made available to pay the bankrupt party's creditors. Vanguard was a party to the case because the bankrupt party sued it to prevent it from releasing his IRA funds to his...

What would Samuel Alito's confirmation mean for First Amendment law? It's impossible to be sure, but his appeals court opinions give us some clues. A Justice Alito would likely take a pretty broad view of free speech protections; support religious exemptions from some generally applicable laws; uphold evenhanded benefit programs that include both religious and secular institutions; and uphold the use of religious symbolism by the government. • Free speech. Until the late 1980s, liberal Supreme Court justices generally supported broad free speech rights, and conservative justices usually took a narrower view. No longer. I've studied the votes in free...

Click here to read a letter from Geoffrey C. Hazard, Jr., a Trustee Professor of Law at the University of PensylvaniaClick here to read a letter from Ronald D. Rotunda, a Professor of Law at George Mason University

WASHINGTON — Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito expressed "great respect" for the precedent established by the landmark Roe v. Wade abortion decision but didn't commit to upholding it, senators said Tuesday as Alito began a second week courting their support. Sens. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., and Susan Collins, R-Maine, both used the word "respect" when describing the 55-year-old federal appellate judge's discussions with them on the 1973 ruling that established abortion rights. Alito said "Roe was precedent on which people, a lot of people, relied and had been precedent now for decades and therefore deserved great respect," Lieberman told reporters after...

The recent announcement by Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Arlen Specter that confirmation hearings on Judge Samuel Alito have been postponed until January was only the latest in a series of painful examples of what happens when Senate Republicans wimp out.Senator Specter did not wimp out. The Senate Republican "leadership" wimped out when they made him chairman of the Judiciary Committee after he had fired a shot across the bow of his own President, right after the election, publicly warning President Bush not to nominate anyone to the Supreme Court who would stir up controversy in the Senate.That was the time...

WASHINGTON -- The abortion lobby faces an uphill battle to prevent a pro-life justice from replacing a pro-choice justice on the Supreme Court. That explains why abortion rights activist Kate Michelman cited her personal history to try to generate emotion against the nomination of Federal Appellate Judge Samuel Alito. The problem is that the example she cited is inappropriate and inapplicable.Michelman, longtime former president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, said Alito as a judge affirmed legislation that would have required her to notify a husband who had abandoned her of plans to get an abortion. That raised the prospect of women...

Supreme Court: Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa., announced that the confirmation process for Judge Samuel Alito will be the longest in more than 14 years. Advantage: mudslingers. Former Pennsylvania Rep. Pat Toomey came within a hairsbreadth of beating incumbent Specter for the Republican nomination last year, and there was a big reason: fears that, as the new Judiciary chairman, the socially liberal senator would sabotage President Bush's promise to appoint justices in the mold of Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas. Now the worries about Specter are coming true. In spite of the White House request to wrap up...

The White House decided to employ a politically-palatable, pundit-prescribed exit strategy with the withdrawal of Harriet Miers. Because of that, Miss Miers is no longer a nominee to the United States Supreme Court, and much of America may believe the Bush Administration's contention that she withdrew over a request for documents. In actuality, she withdrew because her 1993 pro-abortion speech came to light, and that was the straw that broke the camel's back for the great Dr. James Dobson, Senator Sam Brownback, Senator John Thune, and any members of the conservative base who had reserved judgment up to that point....

WASHINGTON -- Pop quiz: Which of the following abortion regulations is more restrictive, more burdensome, more likely to lead more women to forgo abortion?(a) Requiring a minor to get the informed consent of her parents, or to get a judge to approve the abortion.(b) Requiring a married woman to sign a form saying that she notified her husband.Can any reasonable person have any doubt? A minor is intrinsically far more subject to the whims, anger, punishment, economic control and retribution of a parent. And the minor is required to get both parents involved in the process and to get them...