Ann Coulter opposes the nomination. [Via Drudge]

The left side of the Blogosphere is all over the map on Supreme Court nominee John G. Roberts. Here are some of the various views:

Billmon: It's not a question of if we oppose him but whether we go to the mat to fight him. As of now, Billmon concludes we should save our ammunition for the next nomination - but he says the liberal lawyer-types discussing the nomination need to learn to fight dirtier because this is all about a continuation of the Republican's down and dirty power grab.

This note was forwarded to me today. It had been posted on a criminal defense list-serv by a criminal defense lawyer and law school classmate of Judge John Roberts. I don't know the author, but I thought I would share it:

I suggest that we not all go running off the cliff here.

John Roberts has the best professional credentials of any nominee in the last twenty years. He's not a raving nut case, and he's not a Scalia or Thomas wedded to an agenda without regard to precedent or process. I went to law school with Roberts and we were in the same study group first year. He's the most intellectually gifted person I have ever met, including the professors. He is also one Hell of a nice guy.

Professor William Stuntz has an interesting article in the New Republic on the Supreme Court's role in the criminal justice system. Sentencing Law and Policy has excerpted some of the most pertinent quotes.

[T]he Supreme Court's most important job is not managing the culture wars. Regulating the never-ending war on crime is a much bigger task. Alas, it may also be the job the Court does worst.

Civilizations define themselves by when, how, and whom they punish. Those choices are especially important in a society like ours, with a long history of both criminal violence and official racism. Forty-five percent of American prisoners are black. The imprisonment rate — the number of prison inmates per 100,000 people — stood at 482 in 2003. Among black males, the figure was 3,405. For black men in their late twenties, the number exceeds 9,000. Court decisions that help shape those numbers are vastly more important than the latest church-state fight. And the justices do shape those numbers, both by what they regulate and by what they leave alone....

I think it's too soon to start opposing Judge John G. Roberts. Most of us knew nothing about him before tonight. He's only been a Judge for two years. Before that he was deputy solicitor general. The legal arguments he made while working for the Government or as a corporate lawyer may or may not reflect his personal values, or how he would rule as a Supreme Court Justice.

I'd like to know more about him before I make up my mind. I don't think it helps that liberal groups are coming out swinging so soon. It has the appearance that they would oppose anyone Bush would nominate.

It's obvious we're going to get a conservative Supreme Court nominee. Bush is President and the Senate is Republican-dominated. For now, I'm just happy it wasn't a rabid right-winger like Janice Rogers Brown, Priscilla Owen, Edith Jones (not to be confused with Edith Clement, who probably would have been okay,) Ted Olson or one of the Fourth Circuit judges that were reportedly under consideration.

I'm more worried about Bush's second pick, the one he will make when Chief Justice Rehnquist retires, when his key aides may be out from under the gun of, or already indicted by, Fitzgerald's grand jury.

I do not want to fall into the Administration's trap of getting so distracted by this judicial nomination that I don't pay attention to other injustices of the Administration, like the war in Iraq, the detainees, military tribunals, the potential abolition of habeas corpus in death cases, and Rove Gate, to name a few.

So, when there's something big to report on Judge John G. Roberts I will, but I'm done with the topic for now.

Update: Sentencing Law and Policy:

I just received an interesting report that there is a rumor going around on a national death penalty discussion list "that Roberts is a 'pro-life conservative' and personally opposed to the death penalty."

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Original Post

The Washington Post reports:

CRIMINAL MATTERS: His votes on the bench have been mixed. He ruled in favor of a man who challenged his sentence for fraud, then said police did not violate the constitutional rights of a 12-year-old girl who was arrested, handcuffed and detained for eating a single french fry inside a train station in Washington.

POLICE SEARCHES: Joined an appeals court ruling in 2004 that upheld police trunk searches, even if officers do not say they are looking for evidence of a crime.

MILITARY TRIBUNALS: Roberts was part of a unanimous decision last week that allowed the Pentagon to proceed with plans to use military tribunals to try terrorism suspects held at Guantanamo Bay.

Here is the report (pdf) by People for the American Way on Judge John G. Roberts. Here's the overview:

Roberts’s record is a disturbing one. Among other things, Roberts is hostile to women’s reproductive freedom, and he has taken positions in religious liberty and free speech cases that were detrimental to those fundamental rights. Roberts has limited judicial experience, but even his short tenure as a judge raises serious concerns about his ideology and judicial philosophy.

ScotusBlog's sister blog, Supreme Court Nomination Blog, has these criminal law opinions written

Fourth Amendment
United States v. Lawson, 2005 U.S. App. LEXIS 10798 - Writing for a unanimous panel, Judge Roberts rejected numerous challenges to a conviction for bank robbery. In particular, he upheld the warrantless search of defendant's car. Judge Roberts found that the fact that the car matched an eyewitness description and that officers saw latex gloves on the front seat created probable cause for the search.

Criminal Sentencing
United States v. Mellen, 393 F.3d 175 (D.C. Cir. 2004) - Writing for the majority over a dissent by Judge Henderson, Judge Roberts found that the district court had erred in attributing to the defendant the value of all of the goods stolen by his wife and stored in their shared home. Judge Roberts held that mere knowledge was insufficient to render the defendant responsible for the goods. Instead, the government had to establish that he had agreed to participate in the conspiracy or taken affirmative steps to facilitate the crime.

Ineffective Assistance of Counsel
United States v. Toms, 396 F.3d 427 (D.C. Cir. 2005) - Writing for a unanimous panel, Judge Roberts rejected the defendant's claim that his lawyer failed to provide effective assistance because he failed to call a witness and stipulated to a conviction that had been expunged. Judge Roberts found that some aspects of the challenged conduct were strategic choices and therefore "virtually unchallengable," and that the erroneous stipulation was unreasonable but harmless.

Via the Washington Post, the text of Supreme Court nominee John Robert's 2003 confirmation hearing:

• Part One (pdf)

• Part Two (pdf)

Here is the text of Sen. Dick Durbin's statement on Bush's nomination of Judge John G. Roberts to the Supreme Court. Durbin is on Larry King Live now.

“The next Supreme Court justice will make decisions that will affect the lives of millions of Americans for years to come. Even if a Supreme Court nominee is honest and professionally competent, that person must also be committed to protecting the rights and liberties that are at the core of our democracy.”

“The President had an opportunity to unite the country with his Supreme Court nomination, to nominate an individual in the image of Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. Instead, by putting forward John Roberts' name, President Bush has chosen a more controversial nominee and guaranteed a more controversial confirmation process.”

“Now the Judiciary Committee will begin its work. For my part, I will look for one thing -- will this nominee strive to protect the rights of all Americans or will he be a judicial activist with an ideological agenda rather than an independent judge with an open mind.”

The pro-choice groups are already weighing in on Bush's selection of D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals Judge John G. Roberts as a nominee for the Supreme Court. Just in from NARAL:

• As Deputy Solicitor General, Roberts argued in a brief before the U.S. Supreme Court (in a case that did not implicate Roe v. Wade) that “[w]e continue to believe that Roe was wrongly decided and should be overruled…. [T]he Court’s conclusion in Roe that there is a fundamental right to an abortion… finds no support in the text, structure, or history of the Constitution.”

Update: The ACLU weighs in:

Update: Senator Jeff Sessions, one of radical right cabal, is praising the decision on CNN, he can hardly contain his glee. So Bush sold out to the radical right. Plus, Sessions already lies. He said on CNN Roberts was overwhelmingly approved both in the Judiciary Committee and in the full Senate. Reuters reports:

He joined the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia in May 2003 after a protracted confirmation fight in the Senate.

Sen. John Cornyn just got busted with the same lie on Fox News. He said Roberts was unanimously voted out of the Judiciary Committee. The reporter corrected him and said Kennedy, Durbin and Schumer voted against him.

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It's not Edith Clement, It's D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals Judge John G. Roberts, Jr. Here's Harry Reid's statement:

STATEMENT OF SENATOR HARRY REID ON THE NOMINATION OF JOHN ROBERTS TO THE U.S. SUPREME COURT

The President has made his choice. Now the Senate will do its job of deciding whether to confirm John Roberts to a lifetime seat on the Supreme Court.

The President has chosen someone with suitable legal credentials, but that is not the end of our inquiry. The Senate must review Judge Roberts¹s record to determine if he has a demonstrated commitment to the core American values of freedom, equality and fairness. The nominee will have an opportunity to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee and make his case to the American people.

I will not pre-judge this nomination. I look forward to learning more about Judge Roberts.

He's a former law clerk for Chief Justice Rehnquist and has argued 39 cases before the Supreme Court as a lawyer.