Race-Card Arlen. For Specter, politics trumps the Constitution on race.

November 09, 2004, 2:43 p.m.
Race-Card Arlen
For Specter, politics trumps the Constitution on race.

Ramesh Ponnuru noted on "The Corner" Monday that Arlen Specter is bad not just on Roe v. Wade, but on another hot-button judicial issue, namely racial preferences. Ramesh points out that Specter wanted the Bush administration to defend racial preferences in university admissions, which is troubling enough, and when Bush declined to do so before the Supreme Court, Specter threatened to push back. "We are assertive when we think the circumstances warrant it, and I think this issue does," Specter said. "There are things we can do about it in the Senate. When Supreme Court nominees come up, you can bet I'll be on this point." In other words, Specter is on record as saying that he will do what he can to make sure that justices — and, presumably, judges — who believe in colorblind law are not confirmed.

That's enough to disqualify him from heading the Senate Judiciary Committee, even if he had said nothing else on that subject, and even if he had said nothing on Roe v. Wade. And, of course, he has threatened the president's nominees on the abortion issue, and he has also has a lengthy and bad record on racial preferences. Indeed, his recent threat to the president on the issue of preferences is no surprise to anyone familiar with Senator Specter's record.

In 1997, for instance, Specter was the only Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee to vote in favor of confirming the pro-preference Bill Lann Lee to head the Justice Department's civil-rights division under President Clinton. The Senate Judiciary Committee's hearings on Lee were high profile and emotional, and the vote boiled down to whether the nation's principal law-enforcement arm for civil rights should be run by someone who did not believe that the civil rights laws should or do protect all Americans equally. Every Republican voted against Lee, except Specter, and as a result Lee's nomination was blocked but not actually rejected. Clinton seized this fig leaf to put Lee in place on an "acting" basis instead, and eventually gave him a recess appointment. Lee turned out to be just as bad as the Republicans had feared; it's unlikely that he would have been put in place had Specter voted with the rest of his party colleagues to send Lee packing.

Conversely, under a Republican president in 1985, Specter played a decisive role in defeating the nomination of an anti-preference stalwart. Ronald Reagan wanted to promote William Bradford Reynolds to the number-three slot at the Justice Department, but the nomination was controversial because of Reynolds's high-profile opposition to racial preferences. Here, too, Specter broke ranks with his Republican colleagues on the Judiciary Committee, and as a result Reynolds never made it to the Senate floor.

Specter also voted against Senator Mitch McConnell's 1998 amendment to the federal highway bill to strip preferences out of this legislation. Republicans voted overwhelmingly (36-15) in favor of this legislation, but not Specter. The vote here is all the more remarkable because the McConnell amendment sought to remove the same provision that the Supreme Court had ruled only three years earlier was constitutionally suspect. But, for Specter, politics trumped the Constitution.

Is that last sentence an exaggeration? I don't think so. Perhaps most disturbing of all in Specter's record is his justification for his vote in favor of the pro-preference Bill Lann Lee. According to the Washington Post, "Specter said a Republican decision to defeat Lee 'will make it harder to elect a Republican president in the year 2000' because the party will have difficulty appealing to minority groups and women."

Now, Specter's statement is not true as a political matter. Bush was elected in 2000 despite the Republican vote on Lee, and he was reelected in 2004 despite his administration's opposition to affirmative action in his first term (tepid opposition, to be sure, but that certainly was not the Democrats' characterization of it). The fact of the matter is that most Americans, of all races and ethnicities, oppose preferences — and they are certainly opposed by anyone who would even consider voting for a Republican, even a RINO like Arlen Specter.

But let suppose it were true as a political matter that minorities and women strongly favor preferential treatment for some and not others on the basis of skin color and sex. It is nonetheless quite disturbing that someone who now wants to be head of the Senate Judiciary Committee would counsel his party to reject the principle of nondiscrimination because it might create some political bumps in the road.

In sum, Arlen Specter's voting record and public statements demonstrate that, as chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, he will do his best to make it hard to confirm judges that he and his Democratic allies believe are committed to principles of colorblind justice. That's enough to disqualify him for the chairmanship.

I know you're right about the vote dates.

Still it would be good to let the other Repub Senators know DIRECTLY of our outrage too. They can share our "concerns" with those Committee members and put pressure on them before the committee votes.

THANKS! Golly... it would have been tragic to miss this thread, there have only been about 3,000 so far this last week telling us that Specter (hold on to your hats) is not a conservative.

Santorum, Frist, Kryl, Grassley, etc, ARE conservative, however, and know Specter... they'll take the best course to see our conservative nominees get passed.

"THANKS! Golly... it would have been tragic to miss this thread, there have only been about 3,000 so far this last week telling us that Specter (hold on to your hats) is not a conservative."

Hey Sparky -- READ ON...

The presumptive head of the GOP judiciary committee isn't just "not a conservative," but a flaming anti-Christian, anti-conservative stealth liberal.

I welcome ANOTHER 3,000 threads exposing Arlen Specter as a fraud, a political charlatan, and a liar...

So take your own hat and p*ss in it.

Specter is what he is and everyone here knows exactly what that is.... and so do Santorum, Frist, Kryl, Grassley, etc, who have worked with this man up close for years.

Santorum, Frist, Grassley, Kryl, etc, ARE conservative and actually want to see Bush's nominees get passed. They don't need thousands of faxes and phone calls paralyzing their offices for days at this time telling them the startling fact that conservatives don't like Specter. I signed the petition but I think all these other methods are counter-productive and just making their jobs and our goals more difficult.

Yep... you're one of the ones I would have expected to be smack in the middle of this hysteria-as-activism. As a friend of mine put it, it's the same old "conservatives" snatching defeat from the jaws of victory every single time.

Exactly what would you suggest they do to discourage it? And haven't you been paying attention to the way "conservatives" have gone for the jugular of the few voices who have tried to reassure us that this is under control? Hugh Hewitt, Rush, Grassley, even Bush through Rove's comments.

It's not bad enough that we are doing the Dems a huge favor by trying to dig a deep divide between our conservative and moderate Senators, nope, we also have to give them the bonus of stabbing our actual conservatives in the back for them, too. That's the part that disturbs me the most, I didn't get involved in these Specter threads until I saw "conservatives" trashing folks Bush, Santorum and Frist. And folks here just keep getting worse by day.

"As a friend of mine put it, it's the same old "conservatives" snatching defeat from the jaws of victory every single time."

It takes 3 parts common sense and 1 part courage to stand for principle and clean house within the GOP.

The Dems have their own Specters destroying their party -- the Howard Dean-wing has got them going BACKWARDS.

But in the case of so obvious a historical snake as Specter, and so important a committee as the Judiciary Committee, it's a no-brainer to de-capitate him before he destroys a LARGE component of the GOP win -- Supreme Court appointments...

As a friend of mine put it -- slap some lipstick on ANY pig, then an (R) besides it's name, and some political eunuchs feeled compelled to bring it home to "meet the folks."

Specter was responsible the last time for stealing the victory. EVERYONE knows he'll do it again or at least attempt it. (He will approve only replacements for conservative justices -- his record shows that he is adamant for status quo, ie. a judicial activist court.) How do we help to restore sanity to the bench by putting Specter at the vanguard?

That's the part that just makes no sense at all.

If you look to the past, the Senate needs all the support and backbone we can give them. The faxes and emails do no harm. It only encourages them. Even if they have a plan to overcome Specter down the road, our constant pressure can only help.

Nevertheless, I can find no good reason to approve Specter's appointment. The man came out swinging against Bush, he has a record. If not Specter, who can the Republicans squash? For crying out loud, the Borkinator's first words after election were fighting words. I just don't get it.

It takes 3 parts common sense and 1 part courage to stand for principle and clean house within the GOP.

Which is only rational if we don't need moderates in the GOP and it won't hurt us to "clean house" of them. Only irrational numbskulls believe conservatives can control 100% of the political agenda while only comprising about 30% of the electorate. I wish we could, but it takes 3 parts common sense to be able to see that the numbers don't add up... and 1 part courage to actually face reality.

Save your insults about "political eunuchs" for the day you learn math.

EVERYONE knows he'll do it again or at least attempt it.

Question... who is in the best position to judge Specter's voting record, tendency to abide by agreements with other Senators, and how much ability he will have to torpedo the nominees... us keyboard jockeys or the conservative Senators who have worked side-by-side with him for years?

The facts speak for themselves: both Specter's words and deeds. From all he has done and said, he will support conservative justices so long as they do not tilt the courts from a liberal "balance." Thus he supported Scalia, but denied Bork. The difference: Bork would have tipped the Supreme Court and moved it away from a judicial activist court.

All that he has said and done confirms that he will continue on this tactic. From what I have heard from his peers, men like Cornyn, they do not trust him.

What evidence have you that it will be otherwise? He issued a warning shot to Bush the day after the election, for which he ought to be brought in line. He promised the Pittsburg-Gazette he would continue to keep the courts activist. He believes in an activist court. Nothing supports the view that Specter will work to change the activist courts.

"Only irrational numbskulls believe conservatives can control 100% of the political agenda while only comprising about 30% of the electorate."

Thank you for admitting you are aligned with the Democrats and Specter.

I'll take a shower now.

"All that he [Specter] has said and done confirms that he will continue on this tactic [supporting conservative justices so long as they do not tilt the courts from a liberal "balance."]
From what I have heard from his peers, men like Cornyn, they do not trust him.

What evidence have you that it will be otherwise?"

Don't hold your breath wait for THIS answer:

None whatsoever.

The fact of the matter is NO ONE trusts Arlen Specter.

The man's presense in the Judiary Committee is the proverbial 'fox in the henhouse.'

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