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Re: This Week's Supreme Court Hearings: Alito v. Larry, Moe, and Curley Joe (1/13/06)
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Some readers, whom I know and respect for their intellect, are sending me comments, which they request not to be attributed to themselves,
to the effect that Judge Samuel Alito is unfit to serve on the Supreme Court. Adjectives such as "dishonest," "unethical," "unprincipled," and even
"carnal" are being used to characterize him and his written judicial opinions. Some of these readers even claim to have followed the confirmation hearings.
But if they did, I think they absorbed only the Kennedy, Biden and Schumer inquisitioning.
I don't know the man, and I carry no brief for him. But as I alluded to in my blog entry, the ABA panel, and the panels consisting of Alito's
past and present fellow Appeals Court judges and past law clerks, conveyed that there is near unanimity, among all who have actually worked with
him, that he is among the most ethical and principled, and open- and fair-minded, of any judge they have ever
encountered. These witnesses included liberal Democrats, among them blacks and women. To a person they asserted that Judge Alito, though a
conservative, is the antithesis of an ideologue.
Even the Washington Post is
calling for his confirmation. From its 1/15
lead editorial titled "Confirm Samuel Alito": "He would not have been our pick for the high court. Yet Judge Alito should be confirmed, both
because of his positive qualities as an appellate judge and because of the dangerous precedent his rejection would set. . . . And Judge
Alito is superbly qualified. His record on the bench is that of a thoughtful conservative, not a raging ideologue. He pays careful attention to the
record and doesn't reach for the political outcomes he desires. His colleagues of all stripes speak highly of him. His integrity, notwithstanding
efforts to smear him, remains unimpeached. . . . However one reasonably defines the "mainstream" of contemporary jurisprudence, Judge
Alito's work lies within it. . . . No president should be denied the prerogative of putting a person as qualified as Judge Alito on the
Supreme Court."
I don't think there is any place on the Supreme Court for an ideologue of any stripe. But I also don't think that character assassination,
especially when the accusations fly in the face of the sworn testimony of those who have actually worked with the nominee, has any place in this
process.
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