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Race-Card Arlen
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Candidate
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| Contributor | None Entered |
| Last Edited | None Entered Nov 12, 2004 01:12pm |
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| Category | Commentary |
| News Date | Tuesday, November 9, 2004 06:00:00 AM UTC0:0 |
| Description | Ramesh Ponnuru noted on "The Corner" Monday that Arlen Specter is bad not just on Roe v. Wade, but on another hot-button judicial issue, namely racial preferences. Ramesh points out that Specter wanted the Bush administration to defend racial preferences in university admissions, which is troubling enough, and when Bush declined to do so before the Supreme Court, Specter threatened to push back. "We are assertive when we think the circumstances warrant it, and I think this issue does," Specter said. "There are things we can do about it in the Senate. When Supreme Court nominees come up, you can bet I'll be on this point." In other words, Specter is on record as saying that he will do what he can to make sure that justices — and, presumably, judges — who believe in colorblind law are not confirmed.
That's enough to disqualify him from heading the Senate Judiciary Committee, even if he had said nothing else on that subject, and even if he had said nothing on Roe v. Wade. And, of course, he has threatened the president's nominees on the abortion issue, and he has also has a lengthy and bad record on racial preferences. Indeed, his recent threat to the president on the issue of preferences is no surprise to anyone familiar with Senator Specter's record.
In 1997, for instance, Specter was the only Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee to vote in favor of confirming the pro-preference Bill Lann Lee to head the Justice Department's civil-rights division under President Clinton. The Senate Judiciary Committee's hearings on Lee were high profile and emotional, and the vote boiled down to whether the nation's principal law-enforcement arm for civil rights should be run by someone who did not believe that the civil rights laws should or do protect all Americans equally. Every Republican voted against Lee, except Specter, and as a result Lee's nomination was blocked but not actually rejected. |
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