[Mb-civic] Alito's Credibility Problem - Edward M. Kennedy -
Washington Post Op-Ed
William Swiggard
swiggard at comcast.net
Sat Jan 7 07:23:11 PST 2006
Alito's Credibility Problem
By Edward M. Kennedy
Saturday, January 7, 2006; A17
Every Supreme Court nominee bears a heavy burden to demonstrate that he
or she is committed to the constitutional principles that have been
vital in advancing fairness, decency and equal opportunity in our
society. As Judge Samuel Alito approaches his confirmation hearings next
week, the more we learn about him, the more questions we have about the
credibility of his assurances to us.
Consider these five areas:
1. 1985 job application : Alito was 35 when he applied for an important
political position with Attorney General Ed Meese during the Reagan
administration. Alito sought to demonstrate his "philosophical
commitment" to Meese's legal outlook. He wrote that the 1964 Goldwater
presidential campaign had been his original political inspiration, even
though he was only 14 at the time. His views on the law, he said, were
inspired by his "deep disagreement with Warren Court decisions." He
strongly objected to "usurpation by the judiciary" of the powers of the
president, and supported the "supremacy" of the elected branches over
the judiciary. Not surprisingly, Alito got the job.
The views expressed there raise serious concerns about his ability to
interpret the Constitution with a fair and open mind. When this
embarrassing document came to light, he faced a difficult decision on
whether to defend his 1985 views or walk away from them. When I and
others met him a short time later, he appeared to be renouncing them --
"I was just a 35-year-old seeking a job," he told me. But now he's
seeking another, far more important job. Is he saying that he did not
really mean what he said then?
2. Membership in "Concerned Alumni of Princeton." In 1972, the year
Alito graduated from Princeton University, a group of wealthy alumni
formed Concerned Alumni of Princeton (CAP) to resist the growing influx
of female, African American, Hispanic and even disabled students who
were changing the face of Princeton "as you knew it." The university's
most famous alumnus of the day, basketball star and later U.S. senator
Bill Bradley, was invited into CAP initially but quickly found it
"impossible to remain a member" because of CAP's "right-wing" views. A
special committee of alumni, which included future Senate Majority
Leader Bill Frist, accused CAP of presenting a "distorted and hostile"
view of the university. Alito joined CAP about that time, despite its
purposes and reputation, and remained a member through 1985, when he
cited his CAP membership as another qualification to join the Meese
inner circle.
In 1987, when he was nominated to be U.S. attorney for New Jersey, and
in 1990, when he was nominated for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd
Circuit, he did not mention his CAP membership to the Senate Judiciary
Committee or to then-Sen. Bradley, who introduced him to the committee
at the nomination hearing and endorsed him "100 percent." Bradley says
today that had he known about Alito's long membership in CAP he would
have had serious questions about it. Alito now says he can't remember
anything at all about CAP.
3. Failure to recuse himself in the Vanguard case : In 1990, during the
confirmation process on his nomination to the 3rd Circuit, Alito
disclosed that his largest investment was in Vanguard mutual funds. To
avoid possible conflicts of interest, he promised us that he would
recuse himself from any case involving "the Vanguard companies."
Vanguard continues to be on his recusal list, and his investments in
Vanguard funds have risen from tens of thousands of dollars to hundreds
of thousands. Nevertheless, in 2002 he failed to recuse himself when
assigned to sit on a case in which three Vanguard companies were named
parties and listed prominently on every brief and on his own
pro-Vanguard opinion in the case. In this case, he and the White House
have floated many excuses, but none provided any sensible explanation
for his failure to keep his promise or follow his "personal practice" of
recusing himself whenever there was any possible ethical question about
his participation in a case.
4. His pledge to be absolutely impartial where the government is
concerned : While chairing his confirmation hearings in 1990, I asked
Alito how he could remain neutral in the cases that would come before
him as a 3rd Circuit judge after his more than a dozen years of service
representing the U.S. government. He stated that he would be "absolutely
impartial" in all his cases. But in case after case involving the
actions of U.S. marshals, IRS agents and other government officials, he
has sided with the government and against the citizens, even when his
fellow judges have told him he was off-base.
5. His promise to leave his personal beliefs behind when he became a
judge : That's what he told me in 1990 he would do. But has he? In
November 2000, at one of many Federalist Society meetings he spoke at,
he indicated that he was a true believer when it came to the society's
longstanding theory of an all-powerful executive. His endorsement of
presidential power and his criticism of the Supreme Court for
undermining it made clear that his philosophical commitment in 1985
still drives him.
Alito's words and record must credibly demonstrate that he understands
and supports the role of the Supreme Court in upholding the progress
we've made in guaranteeing that all Americans have an equal chance to
take their rightful place in the nation's future. "Credibility" has
rarely been an issue for Supreme Court nominees, but it is clearly a
major issue for Alito.
The writer is a Democratic senator from Massachusetts.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/06/AR2006010601490.html
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