by TChris

Judge Roberts presumably rubbed sticks together to start a fire in his cave before using a dinosaur bone to scrawl these words on the wall:

Supreme Court nominee John Roberts disparaged state efforts to combat discrimination against women in Reagan-era documents made public Thursday, and wondered whether "encouraging homemakers to become lawyers contributes to the common good."

Does encouraging sexists to join the Supreme Court contribute to the common good?

Altercation today has new ediiton of "Scoring Scotus" - scroll down to "Roberts' Confirmations Hearings: Light on the Mayo or Heavy on the Mustard?" And thanks to Eric for giving me another opportunity to contribute.

by TChris

In July, members of the Bush administration reviewed files at the National Archives concerning Judge Roberts' writings on affirmative action. Now, when Senate Democrats want to review the files, they've gone missing. The National Archives staff is taking the heat for the "clerical error," and claim they can reconstruct the file, but a suspicious mind might wonder why documents concerning a contentious issue disappeared after the administration reviewed them.

Elaine Cassel examines Judge John Roberts and what his confirmation might mean for death penalty jurisprudence. It's not a pretty picture.

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid issued this statement today (received by e-mail) in response to articles suggesting the Dems have already decided not to fight the Supreme Court nomination of Judge John Roberts:

"All this talk about whether Democrats will support the Roberts nomination is laughably premature. The hearings have not even begun. The White House has so far refused to produce relevant documents, and the documents we have seen raise questions about the nominee's commitment to progress on civil rights.

“John Roberts must still persuade the Senate and the American people that he is a worthy replacement for Justice O'Connor and the jury is still out on that."

The Senate is in recess, but the Judiciary Committee lawyers are working through it, day and night, pouring over thousands of pages of released documents on Judge John Roberts to ready the Senators for the confirmation hearings that begin September 6. The Chicago Tribune has an informative article on what the staffers are doing and how the Senators have divided the work.

Specter's staff lawyers are readying talking points to combat negative information, not to be partisan, but to be fair. Cornyn's lawyers essentially admit their partisan role. Sen. Diane Feinstein will take the lead on Roe v. Wade, while Sen. Edward Kennedy will focus on civil rights issues.

Here's a clue to how it's going to go:

by TChris

Definition of "lunatic fringe": a group so far to the right that it considers John Roberts too liberal to sit on the Supreme Court.

A conservative group in Virginia said Tuesday it would oppose Supreme Court nominee John Roberts’ confirmation because of his work helping overturn a Colorado referendum on gays. The stance by Public Advocate of the United States, which describes itself as a pro-family organization, puts it in opposition to conservative groups that have endorsed Roberts.

The group’s president, Eugene Delgaudio, last year criticized Vice President Cheney (another left wing radical) for suggesting that the concept of freedom extends to gays.

by TChris

Update: Attacks on the Supreme Court by politicians who disagree with the Court's rulings threaten the Court's independence, Justice Breyer said today. If Arlen Specter wants to use the Roberts' nomination to send the Court a message, it seems Justice Breyer is taking the opportunity to send a message on behalf of "seven or eight or nine members of the Supreme Court." The message, in essence: leave us alone.

*****
Original post:

It’s funny that a Republican senator would accuse conservative Supreme Court justices of judicial activism, but Arlen Specter, previewing some of the questions he intends to pose to John Roberts, seems to have done just that.

Judge John G. Roberts' wife is a consistent Catholic pro-lifer who opposes the death penalty. She belongs to an anti-capital punishment group. In the article on Justice Stevens' speech critical of the death penalty that I reported on earlier today, someone has called my attention to this statement which I missed.

"It [the death penalty] doesn't appear to be shaping up as a major issue," said Kent Scheidegger, legal director of the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation, a pro-death penalty group.

Scheidegger said that although Roberts' wife, Jane, is a member of a group that opposes capital punishment, Roberts has had no opportunities to vote on death cases in his two years on a federal appeals court.

I've noted that Judge John Roberts is no friend of the criminally accused. The Wall Street Journal (free article) confirms this today. It's worse than I thought.

While Roberts doesn't have an extensive judicial record on criminal issues, his positions as Deputy Solicitor General are troubling, first because he helped decide what cases the office should accept and second, because of information emerging that he is a staunch law and order man.

...one issue that has gotten less public scrutiny has been his staunch law-and-order record. During Judge Roberts's time as principal deputy solicitor general in the administration of George H.W. Bush, his office chose to get involved in dozens of state cases to limit the rights of criminal defendants. The cases backed state prosecutors seeking to preserve convictions won with warrantless searches and confessions obtained without Miranda warnings about the right to remain silent; to dismiss claims by inmates of "cruel and unusual punishments"; and to validate aggressive law-enforcement techniques, such as sobriety checkpoints and "protective sweeps" of crime-infested dwellings.

by TChris

While it's difficult to predict the kind of Supreme Court Justice that John Roberts might become, it is increasingly apparent that his memory is a bit fuzzy. First he didn't remember being on the steering committee of the Washington chapter of the Federalist Society. Then he neglected to disclose that he had been a registered lobbyist for the cosmetics industry.

In a letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee's ranking Democrat, Sen. Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont, Roberts explained that his firm had registered him as a lobbyist because he met with government lawyers as part of his work representing the Cosmetic, Toiletry and Fragrance Assn. At the time, the association sought to block a proposed labeling regulation by the Food and Drug Administration.

...Roberts explained that because his work for the association consisted of preparation for litigation, "the question about lobbying on the questionnaire did not trigger a memory of those meetings."

While much attention is paid to Judge John Roberts' position on Roe v. Wade and the right to privacy, there is another critical issue that he needs to be questioned on: his views towards capital punishment.

The Washington Post reports that at his 2003 confirmation hearing for his seat on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, Sen. Russ Feingold had the following exchange with him: