Bush In Speech Tells Voters That 'Judges Matter'

Main Category: Abortion
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Article Date: 08 Oct 2008 - 6:00 PDT

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On Monday, the opening day of the new Supreme Court session, President Bush traveled to Ohio to address members of the Federalist Society, a conservative legal group, where he stressed that judges "matter to every American" and defended his Supreme Court appointments, the New York Times reports. According to legal experts, Bush's appointments to the high court have been responsible for a "conservative tilt that could long outlast Bush's administration" (Stolberg, New York Times, 10/7).

According to the AP/Minneapolis Star Tribune, Bush noted that he has appointed more than one-third of all sitting federal judges (Loven, AP/Minneapolis Star Tribune, 10/6). He also focused part of the speech on a "longtime Republican complaint" that Democrats have been too slow to confirm, the Washington Post reports. According to the White House, 324 of 376 federal court nominees have been confirmed by the Senate during Bush's tenure, and there are 34 current vacancies. There were 84 judicial vacancies at the end of former President Clinton's tenure, some Democrats said (Eggen, Washington Post, 10/7).

In Bush's speech, he called the two Supreme Court justices he nominated, Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito, "outstanding." He also praised Supreme Court decisions since the appointments of Roberts and Alito, specifically citing the 5-4 decision that upheld the federal Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act (AP/Minneapolis Star Tribune, 10/6). Bush said, "Our belief in judicial restraint is shared by the vast majority of the American people," adding that he had kept his pledge as president to "seek judges who would faithfully interpret the Constitution -- not use the courts to invent laws or dictate social policy." Bush added that the judicial branch has "enormous power" because it is the "only branch of government whose officers are unelected. That means judges on the federal bench must exercise their power prudently -- cautiously -- you might even say, conservatively. And that means that the selection and confirmation of good judges should be a high priority for every American" (Speech text, 10/6).

Although Bush did not mention either presidential nominee, he offered an "implicit endorsement" of Sen. John McCain's (R-Ariz.) judicial philosophy, which is similar to that of Bush's in terms of appointing conservative judges (Washington Post, 10/7). According to the Times, although judicial appointments often have been used by the Republican Party to garner support for its candidates, with the focus this year "intensely on the economy and, to a lesser extent, Iraq, it is unclear how much attention Americans are paying to the courts."

In response to Bush's speech, Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said that the impact of the president's judicial appointments are "being harshly felt by ordinary Americans" (New York Times, 10/7). He added, "We cannot afford more of the same if Americans' rights and liberties are to be preserved." Nan Aron, president of the Alliance for Justice, said that 10 of the country's 13 federal appellate courts are "dominated by conservatives" and that Roberts and Alito are part of a "conservative juggernaut." Aron added, "This administration has cemented a transformation of our federal judiciary begun by Ronald Reagan, which has resulted in less freedom, less privacy and fewer constitutional protections" (Washington Post, 10/7).

Opinion Piece

Despite the possibility that the next president will make several appointments to the Supreme Court, both McCain and Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) are "virtually ignoring the importance of this election in determining the composition of the Supreme Court and the future of constitutional law," Erwin Chemerinsky, dean and professor at the University of California-Irvine School of Law, writes in a Los Angeles Times opinion piece. Although the "candidates' mentions of the issue have been few, it is clear that there is a sharp difference between them as to what type of individuals they would name to the Supreme Court," Chemerinsky adds.

For example, Chemerinsky writes that if "McCain gets to replace any of these justices, let alone more than one, there likely will be dramatic changes in many areas of constitutional law." He adds, "There are almost certainly four votes on the current court ... to overrule Roe v. Wade and allow the government to prohibit abortion. In light of McCain's emphatic opposition to abortion rights, he likely would appoint the decisive fifth vote to end constitutional protection of those rights. Obama, by contrast, would almost certainly appoint individuals who would reaffirm Roe." Moreover, Chemerinsky writes that the candidates, particularly Obama, "seem to want to avoid the underlying constitutional issues. For example, Obama rarely emphasizes his support for abortion rights, being content to say that the goal should be to decrease the number of abortions."

Chemerinsky writes, "Even with the economic crisis and the war in Iraq as dominant political issues, there is time to discuss the president's role in filling judicial vacancies," concluding, "The stakes are no less than the content of constitutional rights for a generation to come" (Chemerinsky, Los Angeles Times, 10/7).

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