WASHINGTON — Three years ago, before today’s white-hot struggle over judicial appointments and the philosophical direction of the federal courts grabbed hold of official Washington, a soft-spoken Virginia conservative and a loquacious New York liberal met at the Library of Congress to bat around some ideas. Brought together by the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III of Charlottesville and Sen. Charles Schumer of New York carried on a friendly debate over the role of political ideology in shaping legal decisions and influencing congressional evaluations of judicial nominees. It’s unlikely many minds were changed during the...