Headed Southwick? The case against Bush's latest controversial judicial nominee

[babylonsister]

http://www.slate.com/id/2167564/pagenum/all/#page_start

Headed Southwick?
The case against Bush's latest controversial judicial nominee.
By Emily Bazelon
Posted Monday, June 4, 2007

As a judge on the Mississippi Court of Appeals for 12 years, Leslie Southwick participated in more than 7,000 cases. Now he is President Bush's nominee for a long-vacant seat on the Fifth Circuit, one of the federal appeals courts. At Southwick's confirmation hearing, Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., asked him to give an example of an unpopular decision he'd made in favor of somebody downtrodden—a poor person, or a member of a minority group, or someone who'd simply turned to the courts for help. Judge Southwick couldn't name a single one.

The question might sound like a bit of a stunt. But other data show that Judge Southwick's answer fits with his larger record. He has a pattern of voting against workers and the injured and in favor of corporations. According to the advocacy group Alliance for Justice, Southwick voted "against the injured party and in favor of business interests" in 160 of 180 cases that gave rise to a dissent and that involved employment law and injury-based suits for damages. When one judge on a panel dissents in a case, there's an argument it could come out either way, which makes these cases a good measure of how a judge thinks when he's got some legal leeway. In such cases, Judge Southwick almost never favors the rights of workers or people who've suffered discrimination or been harmed by a shoddy product.

If President Bush had a Republican Senate behind him, Judge Southwick would no doubt sail through. He's the president's third try to fill a seat that's been vacant since 2003: The first nominee, Charles Pickering, went down in flames in 2004; the second one, Michael Wallace, was withdrawn. But Democrats control the judiciary committee, which will vote on Southwick's nomination Thursday. So, why is his confirmation hovering between likely and possible?

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[tech3149]

1. being appointed to a court with 11 of 15 Repub ? I say no way

especially not considering the record cited in the article.