We have no reason to believe that, certainly not from his legacy as a governor where less than one-third of his judicial appointees were Republican and a couple were even homosexual activists. If you haven't done so already, please Google the search terms "Romney" and "judicial appointments."
Would he be willing to show his good faith by identifying now who he will commit to appointing to the Supreme Court? Probably not.
Would he be willing to show his good faith by making a commitment now to appoint to the Supreme Court only men or women who have committed themselves to overturning Roe v. Wade? Probably not.
What commitments would he be willing to make now? Given his demonstrated flexibility through time, would any kind of commitment from him mean anything?
Did you know that he has said that he would appoint judges like Chief Justice Roberts?
Fair enough. But the fact remains that of the two guys running, of which one will be President, Romney is the only chance for good judges. He might surprise us. Obama will not surprise us; he will put atrocious, terrible judges like Sotomayor and Kagan on the bench. There is no doubt at all about that.
If Romney wins and gets a Sup Court opening in his first term, then he’d be hard pressed not to nominate a known conservative because to do otherwise would sink his reelection chances by losing the base. Even if the Dems were to keep the Senate, Romney would lose all support from the social conservative base if he were to betray on a Sup Court pick. As President, he would be held to a different standard than he was as governor of a hopelessly left wing state.
Would Romney identify who he would nominate now, during the campaign? No, I doubt it. Has any candidate ever done that?
Would Romney pledge to nominate judges devoted to overturning Roe? Again, I doubt it. But again, did McCain, Bush, Dole, Bush, or Reagan even do that? I know they all spoke of picking judges who won’t legislate from the bench, but have they ever pledged to nominate anti-Roe judges in such explicit terms?
The only commitments he’d likely make now are the ones that other GOP nominees have done, like I said above. Is it meaningless? Yeah, probably, but I don’t think it’s fair to hold that against Romney and not the others.
As to his pro-Roberts comments; when did he say that? I’ll bet it was before the anti-Arizona and pro-Obamacare rulings that Roberts crapped out. Really though, who saw those coming? I know there were a few prescient observers who said Roberts would save Obamacare, but most thought it would be Kennedy who crossed over if anyone did. Until the Arizona and Obamacare cases though, Roberts record was mostly good. He got the Second Amendment cases and the partial birth abortion case right to name a couple. As bad as his last two decision were, the jury is still out on Roberts. Yes, I fear he is ‘evolving’ in office and will go left on more and more cases (but I’m a pessimist), but it’s too early to say. It won’t take long though. Soon a new affirmative action case will go before the Sup Court, and marriage can’t be far behind.
I share the skepticism of Romney. But either he or Obama will be elected President in November. On judges and so many other things, its a choice between a chance and a known terrible entity.
And we should never forget that even the great Reagan only got one good Sup Court pick confirmed. To be fair, Kennedy was a third choice, but there was no excuse for picking O’Connor. What a wasted pick. And of course Bush the Elder gave us Souter, and by extension Kagan (or Sotomayor...I forget the order). If other Republican presidents had done what they promised then we’d have 5 conservatives on the bench right now, with Roberts being a cushion 6th vote.