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Liberals setting stage for assault on court nominee

By BILL ADAIR
Published August 20, 2005

WASHINGTON - Leaders of liberal groups held a news conference Friday about Supreme Court nominee John G. Roberts Jr. in an ornate room at the Capitol that used to be Lyndon Johnson's office. A Norman Rockwell portrait of the former president kept an eye on the proceedings from the back wall.

The setting was appropriate because many of the liberals' concerns about Roberts involve civil rights, a centerpiece of Johnson's legacy. But the comments from the podium Friday lacked Johnson's blunt style.

The leaders of groups such as the Alliance for Justice and People for the American Way chose their words carefully. They insisted they haven't decided if they will oppose Roberts.

They said only that they are "troubled" by his memos when he worked in the Reagan administration and that they want the White House to release documents he wrote in the early 1990s, when he was a deputy solicitor general.

In the dog days of August, it has seemed the Roberts nomination was on autopilot. Senators fled the capital for vacation and the liberals seemed oddly quiet.

Have they gone soft? Will Roberts skate through without a fight?

No and no.

The measured remarks are part of their strategy to be thorough and deliberate. They are laying the groundwork for an announcement - possibly as early as next week - when they are likely to come out against him with guns blazing.

But they are being careful to justify their opposition with his own words from memos and letters.

For much of the summer, Roberts has been like Capt. Tuttle, Hawkeye's imaginary friend in an episode of M*A*S*H. He was a blank slate, but everybody said he was a nice guy, even people who hadn't met him. Democrats were frustrated they couldn't get the goods on the guy.

But a steady drip-drip-drip of documents, along with a torrent of 50,000 new ones on Thursday, has provided the liberal groups with material to make a case that Roberts is too conservative.

"Each time we think we have the picture, something new comes up," said Jocelyn Frye, director of legal and public policy for the National Partnership for Women & Families.

The memos indicate he was in synch with the conservatives in the Reagan administration. He opposed efforts to strengthen women's rights and he disparaged "the purported gender gap," according to the Washington Post. He also questioned "whether encouraging homemakers to become lawyers contributes to the common good." The White House says he was just making a lawyer joke.

Frye said the documents show "he has a very narrow view" of the Constitution.

Opposing Roberts because of his conservative ideology is just one prong of their strategy. The liberals are also likely to oppose him because of the administration's refusal to release his memos. That worked when they defeated the judicial nomination of Miguel Estrada.

At Friday's press conference, the liberal leaders said the public had a right to see Roberts' letters and memos from more than a dozen cases when he was deputy solicitor general.

"This is an administration that is obsessed with secrecy," said David Bookbinder, a lawyer with the Sierra Club.

Nan Aron, president of the Alliance for Justice, said, "White House refusal to release these documents establishes a very dangerous precedent."

Assuming the White House sticks with its refusal to release them, the groups can come back and say that the president is stonewalling and that Roberts should be defeated.

Despite the growing opposition, it's still likely he'll be confirmed. Republicans have a solid majority in the Senate, and even Democrats acknowledge that he is a top-notch lawyer.

But the fight isn't over yet.

Not quite.

[Last modified August 20, 2005, 01:32:01]