Posted on 09/15/2005 6:20:03 AM PDT by wcdukenfield
Conservative strategists are drafting a letter to Democratic members of the Senate Judiciary Committee demanding the release of hundreds of internal memos detailing contacts between the lawmakers and liberal interest groups opposing John Roberts’ nomination to the Supreme Court.
By planning to press Democrats on the sensitive subject, conservatives seem to be pulling a page from the Democrats’ own political playbook. In the weeks leading up to the confirmation hearings, Senate Democrats have repeatedly called on the White House to give them memos Roberts penned while he was deputy solicitor general in President George H.W. Bush’s administration.
Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), the ranking member on the Judiciary Committee, raised the issue again yesterday by releasing a letter dated Sept. 9 from William Moschella, the assistant attorney general. In the letter, Moschella declined to disclose legal memos from Roberts’ tenure in the Office of the Solicitor General.
”It is regrettable that the Bush administration persists in keeping this information from the Senate,” Leahy said. “These documents, from the period of Judge Roberts’ most substantive work experience in the executive branch, would help illuminate his views and earlier decisions on a wide range of key issues that are of vital importance to the American people and to the Senate.”
In their letter, conservatives quote Leahy’s argument that the Senate should have access to the withheld documents. In the letter, they assert that the public is equally entitled to know what is motivating and directing Senate Democratic scrutiny of Roberts, according to a verbal summary given to The Hill.
”Given your demand that the Justice Department hand over John Roberts’ work documents during his time as deputy solicitor general, you should have no reservations about approving the release of the full complement of documents that make up all of the Memogate papers,” conservatives wrote in a draft of the letter, which will be circulated for signatures starting today. About 30 conservative leaders or more are expected to sign it.
A spokeswoman for the Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee declined to comment without first seeing a copy of the letter.
Specifically, conservatives want access to what they estimate may be as many as 4,000 Democratic memos that are in Senate Sergeant at Arms William Pickles’ possession. Last year, Pickle seized Senate Judiciary Committee computers during an investigation. Democrats on the committee called for the probe after internal memos written by aides to Sens. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) and Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) were made available to the press without Kennedy’s or Durbin’s consent.
The publicized memos detailed contacts between leading liberal members on the committee and groups that lobbied them on President Bush’s judicial nominees.
In their letter to Democrats, conservatives plan to argue that the memos are not protected by attorney-client privilege, giving them a stronger claim to the documents, they assert, than the Democrats have to the solicitor general’s documents. Roberts’ defenders have argued that a solicitor general’s relationship to a president is akin to an attorney-client relationship and deserves special privilege.
Mark Levin, president of the Landmark Legal Foundation, a conservative public-interest-litigation firm, said that he was familiar with the letter and plans to circulate it.
”I fully support it,” he said. “I’ve always thought that the Congress and the Senate Judiciary Committee in particular gets away with a hypocritical standard. They demand that the executive branch produce everything, and yet on the other hand they refuse to make anything public.”
Kay Daly, president of Coalition for a Fair Judiciary, a conservative group defending Roberts, said she was aware of the letter.
”There are some 4,000 memos locked away in the sergeant at arms’ office that the public has a right to know about,” she said.
Daly said that the since the taxpayers fund the salaries of lawmakers and their aides they have a right to know about their work.
Conservatives said their case is bolstered by a memo sent by the Senate archivist to all Judiciary Committee staff members instructing them to preserve all documents and e-mails related to Roberts’ confirmation proceedings, including correspondence with outside groups. Conservatives cite the archivist’s message to support their claim that the internal memos held by the sergeant at arms should be made part of the public domain.
Jeff Lord, who served as associate political director in the Reagan administration from 1985 to 1988 and is working with Progress for America, a pro-Roberts advocacy group, has called for the Democratic memos to be made public during recent trips to Washington state and North Dakota. He traveled to those states to promote a new book he has written about the contentious 2002 Senate confirmation battle over Judge Brooks Smith’ss appointment to the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
Lord called the memos “some of the most revealing things I’ve ever seen while in government,” adding that the evidence of coordination between Democratic senators and third-party groups in the memos made public was “eye-opening.”
One of the publicized memos, by a former aide to Kennedy and dated April 2002, reported that Elaine Jones of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund had asked Democrats to postpone the nomination of Judge Julia Gibbons to the 6th Circuit court until a key case on affirmative action had been decided. Conservatives consider it one of the most damning of the publicized batch.
The memo was downloaded from the Judiciary Committee server and made public in 2003.
What's good for the goose...
I'll believe this when I see it. Conservatives do not know how to play hard ball. We're a bunch of wussies.
While I love this approach, I must admit to finding its timing curious. (If Roberts is as close to confirmation as most politicians maintain he is.)
The Republicans never pressed on Miranda's rights when different liberal "rights" organizations were fighting against his approval to the appeals court.
You mean Miguel Estrada?
Agreed. It's about time we started playing HARD BALL with the libturds.
"Nice guys finish LAST." Leo Duroucher.
I think they are just setting the standard for the next nomination.
One thing for sure, all the Dems games that they created and played, have been picked up and played better by the Reps.
Maybe not Press/MSM or Congressional action wise, see judical filibusters, but certainly where it counts, at the voting Booths.
By the way, great photos on your profile page! :-)
Could be... but this move could also backfire. Again, I like the approach, just can't figure out why it's being used right now.
Let's hope it's true PING...
bookmk ping for later , and thanks for the "Leo the Lip" quote ,...I gotta get to work , see ya
There's a second vacancy that needs to be filled. This is a preemptive strike.
Ditto!
I agree 1000%.
This is WAR.
This could have a lot to do with the next nominee. Warning the dems that they are ready to play ball.
Think about it... The pubbies are finally throwing down a gauntlet, exposing the Rats and their cohorts BEFORE Bush names his next nominee. I think it's brilliant and love the mental picture: Turning on the lights and watching roaches head for cover.
Conservatives know how to play hardball;its just that there are not enough of them so the RINO's end up controlling the plays.
Wish they'd nominate him!
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