In a very strong editorial Sunday, Judging Michael McConnell, the New York Times urges the Senate to reject the nomination of Michael McConnell to the 10th Circuit. The concerns of the NY Times are similar to the ones we've been expressing.

The Times acknowedges, as do we, that Mr. O'Connell possesses the personal qualifications to be a federal judge.

But that isn't enough. The Senate must also consider "whether the nominee's views on substantive legal matters are consistent with the nation's needs. There is no single litmus test to apply, but a constellation of positions to consider on key issues: racial and other kinds of equality, a woman's right to a safe and legal abortion, civil liberties, and federalism."

"Mr. McConnell disapproves of the Supreme Court's decision in the 1983 Bob Jones University case in which the justices rightly decided that banning interracial dating among the college's students was racial discrimination. He would require the government to subsidize, through tax deductions, schools like Bob Jones. He has also spoken out against the Supreme Court's one-person, one-vote decisions, which overhauled the nation's discriminatory legislative districting."

"The Senate must also be highly skeptical of nominees who do not acknowledge a woman's right to abortion. Mr. McConnell has not merely expressed abstract reservations about the Roe v. Wade ruling, but has also actively crusaded against it. He signed a statement arguing that fetuses deserved constitutional protection. "

"On the critical issue of federalism, Mr. McConnell wants to cut back the power of Congress to protect people from things like discrimination, pollution and unsafe working conditions and to insulate state government from lawsuits when they engage in wrongs of that kind."

"....Mr. McConnell's musings nearly all point in one direction, and that is the reason the administration nominated him. It is the reason the Senate should reject him."

The Democrats should not confirm a judge if they believe the judge's ideology will prevent him or her from adhering to established precedent on civil rights and individual liberties. They should not vote to confirm a judge solely because the judge is less objectionable than a previously rejected nominee, e.g., they should not vote to confirm McConnell only because he is not as bad as Priscilla Owens and they don't want to appear intransigent on all of the Bush nominees.

We are entitled, as a nation, to judges that will uphold the law. So far, Bush's nominees have had outlandish and extreme right-wing beliefs that have no place on a federal bench. It is Congress' duty to reject every single one of these nominees. The future of the rule of law depends on it. Intimidation and the fear of appearing partisan are cosmetic considerations that pale in comparison with the danger Bush's extremist nominees pose to American jurisprudence.