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."
Could Scalia be salivating at the thought of having on the Court someone who he believes he can take by the hand and lead in his direction. Why it would almost be like him having two votes.
The result might be great but I prefer an equal to Scalia usually coming to the same conclusion by their own articulable reason and intellect.
Evidence?
Time to burn Scalia at the stack and drown him at the same time. He may be defending Miers.
We are. Step aside.
Scalia is saying that particular criticism is off base.
My observation disagrees somewhat with that. I don't believe the objections to her not having sat on the bench are per se. "Sat on the bench" is one way that a potential jurist reveals their judicial philosophy, but it is not the only way. One must infer Miers constitutional temperament from information. There is very little where she has expressed it directly.
Scalia is saying that never having been a judge is not a disqualifing factor. And of course, it is not. I don't see anything in Justice Scalia's comments that show an opinion one way or the other about "the politics" of selecting a Justice.
It is undeniable that many conservaitves are disappointed in the pick, but not necssarily in the person, Harriet Miers. The pick sparked a bit of a political firestorm. And instead of defending and advocating constitutional principles, we are collectively engaged in defending "the pick." And nary a peep or objection from the GOP about the gang of 14 or the anti-constitutional 60 vote supermajority. Even the President appears to have capitulated to THAT.
Because he's not talking about Roberts replacing Renquist as CJ. He's talking about Miers replacing Renquist as a justice who came to the Court with no prior judicial experience.
Context.
Oh, sweet sanity.
Put me in with the hysterical knee-jerk shriekers. Thanks.
The Miers acolytes are clinging to his words-which are NOT an endorsement in any way of Ms. Miers-because there are so few distinguished, reputable legal scholars who have been pleased with this nomination.
Obviously not. Roberts was a judge.
Wow............aren't you dizzy from THAT spin?
Roberts WAS a judge before coming to the Court. Let's get it right, folks.
He was talking about taking his place on the Court as someone who had never been a judge, not his slot specifically.
You just keep on changing the story, but they are all false.
the line about Miers taking the place of Rehnquist is misleading, in the sense that the slot has already been taken (by Judge John Roberts).
You're splitting hairs now that you've been shown you're wrong.
You know very well that Rehnquist never was a judge; that was the parallel.
You seem to need Romper Room News to figure these things out.
scalia stated that it is worthwhile to have someone without prior judicial experience, just as CJ rehnquist had none when he arrived at the court. he was not referring to his LITERAL replacement on the bench.
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