Source:
CBS News(CBS)
As he goes about making his first - but probably not last - appointment to the United States Supreme Court, President Barack Obama surely knows that he’s playing a very strong hand.
He has a clear majority of fellow Democrats in the United States Senate - whether the figure reaches 60 or not doesn’t really matter for our purposes here - and a trove of well-qualified, moderate jurists from which to choose.It’s been 15 years since a Democratic president got to appoint a justice. Back then, in 1994, President Bill Clinton selected a moderate liberal from the lower federal courts, Stephen Breyer, to replace the moderate conservative (and Republican appointee) Harry A Blackmun. Now, in the coming weeks, President Obama will have to decide who he wants to replace David H. Souter, another practical, left-moderate jurist, who evidently has plans to ride off in the New England sunset.
Fifteen years of frustrated Democratic nominees has caused quite a back-up of candidates. But the Obama Administration already has offered some serious clues about the sort of person they’d like to try to put onto the court. Six weeks ago, when asked about a potential Supreme Court nomination, a senior Administration official told reporters that the White House is looking for people with experience in law and in life, people with character and commitments to a community, people who can make hard decisions but still have empathy for the litigants before them.
If these job qualifications are accurate - if they aren’t just spin - they suggest strongly that the President will look beyond the lower federal courts for his first selection.
(snip)
Let’s start with the political angle. How about Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm? Like the president, she is a graduate of Harvard Law School. She was a federal prosecutor and a county attorney before she went (successfully, it seems) into politics. Could we not use another O’Connor on the court mixing brains with consensus building? Of course we could. A longshot in this category would be Deval Patrick, the Governor of Massachusetts and also the product of Harvard Law School. His friendship with the president might take him out of the running, at least for this vacancy.
Let’s stay with the Harvard Law School angle. How about Kathleen Sullivan? The prominent constitutional scholar was dean of the Stanford Law School after she taught at Harvard Law School. Sullivan doesn’t possess the political experience that Granholm or Patrick possess, but she did fail her first bar exam, which counts for something in my book. Solicitor General Elena Kagan (and former HLS alum) also will get some support although she may need a few years arguing before the Justices before she gets serious consideration for being one.
Now let’s go with the Chicago angle. How about Diane Wood? She gets a strike against her because she is a federal appeals court judge (7th Circuit) but she also gets a big plus for long-being a professor at the vaunted University of Chicago Law School.
Or Cass Sunstein? He’s a brilliant writer and scholar, with University of Chicago ties, who happens to be already working for the president at the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. If the White House picks a white guy then I’m betting that Sunstein’s the man.
many more names worth looking at link:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/05/01/opinion/courtwatch/main4982170.shtml
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