Stuart Taylor, Jr.’s media appearances in print publications.
The birthing process was protracted, ugly, and unprincipled. But the baby doesn’t look as bad as expected. And it may do OK unless it’s strangled in its crib by Congress or abused by the judiciary.
Many human-rights groups and other critics of Bush administration policy on squeezing information out of captured terrorism suspects would have you believe that even mildly coercive "stress" interrogation methods are clearly illegal and indistinguishable from torture.
Amid the uproar over the possible responsibility of White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales in the abuse of many "enemy combatants," a substantial consensus on the need for congressional rules to govern the detention of such people is quietly emerging among experts, including moderate conservatives, moderate liberals, and even some strong libertarians.
A lot of liberals, and a lot of conservatives, think that President Bush is speaking in code when he says he would nominate to the Supreme Court "strict constructionists" who would "faithfully interpret the law, not legislate from the bench."
Just as liberal activist judges have driven millions of moderates into the Republican fold, conservative activist judges could drive them back out. Karl Rove must know this. So must Bush.
After all, didn’t Bush once cite Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas as his model justices? And haven’t they both voted to overrule Roe v. Wade? To uphold laws making homosexual acts criminal? To outlaw government use of racial preferences? To allow state-sponsored school prayers (at least at graduations and football games)? To require states to subsidize religious instruction (at least in some contexts)? To overrule Miranda v. Arizona? To strike down many federal laws as violating states’ rights?
Well, yes – but. Bush surely has committed himself to naming to the Court conservatives who would not invent new constitutional rights. But some conservative jurists are far less radical, and far more deferential to established precedents, than others. And if you imagine that Bush wants to pack the Court with Scalia/Thomas clones determined to sweep aside Roe and a raft of other liberal precedents, ask yourself this: What would that do to Republicans’ hope of securing their fragile majority status, and to Bush’s legacy?
The answer is that just as liberal activist judges have driven millions of moderates into the Republican fold, conservative activist judges could drive them back out. Karl Rove must know this. So must Bush.
Consultation. Conciliation. Compromise. Such concepts are in eclipse these days in Washington. Everyone is getting ready for the mother of all confirmation battles. As soon as one of the nine aging Supreme Court justices retires, sports fans expect, President Bush will pick a clone of Antonin Scalia or Clarence Thomas. Liberal groups will "Bork" the nominee as a retrograde, right-wing judicial activist bent on forcing women into back-alley abortions, pushing gays back into the closet, resegregating higher education, imposing a fundamentalist Christian theocracy, and promiscuously paving the habitats of endangered species. And then there will be all of the oppo dirt-digging for ethical lapses, libidinous excesses, and other embarrassments.
Veteran Washington superlobbyist Tom Korologos, now ambassador to Belgium, had some pithy words of wisdom for past Republican Supreme Court nominees whom he helped shepherd through the process: "Your role is that of a bridegroom at a wedding. Stay out of the way, be on time, and keep your mouth shut."
President Bush is keeping confidential his short list of possible nominees should one or more Supreme Court justices retire. But in conversations with former White House officials and others, the same names keep coming up. Brief biographies of 10 of them follow, very roughly in order of their prominence in the Supreme Court succession speculation game.
The 35-year-old debate about affirmative action in university admissions has often focused on whether the supposed benefits to black and Hispanic students justify the costs to whites and Asians who lose out, and the resulting racial divisions and resentments.
A lot of liberals, and a lot of conservatives, think that President Bush is speaking in code when he says he would nominate to the Supreme Court "strict constructionists" who would "faithfully interpret the law, not legislate from the bench."
White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales is an amiable man with an inspiring personal story. One of eight children of uneducated Mexican-American immigrants, he grew up in a Texas house with no hot water or telephone. He would be the first Hispanic attorney general. He has the complete trust of the president, whom he has loyally served for four years in Washington, and in Texas before that. He is far less divisive and confrontational than the departing John Ashcroft.
