This morning President Bush nominated White House counsel Harriet Miers, who has never served as a judge, to replace retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor on the Supreme Court. If confirmed by the Senate, Miers would join Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg as the second woman on the nation's highest court and the third to serve.
"She has devoted her life to the rule of law and the cause of justice," Bush said at the announcement. "She will be an outstanding addition to the Supreme Court of the United States ... She will strictly interpret our Constitution and laws. She will not legislate from the bench," Bush said.
"If confirmed, I recognize I will have a tremendous responsibility to keep our judicial system strong and to help insure the court meets their obligations to strictly apply the laws and Constitution," Miers said.
Bush was under intense pressure to nominate a woman to replace the retiring O'Connor. With her lack of a judicial paper trail, some feel Democrats will have difficulty opposing her nomination. According to AP, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., had urged the administration to consider Miers.
Interestingly, Bush's announcement coincides with John Roberts' first day of work as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.
The White House released a bio of Miers this morning:
- Harriet Miers was born in Dallas, Texas on August 10, 1945.
Ms. Miers received her bachelor's degree in Mathematics in 1967 and J.D. in 1970 from Southern Methodist University.
Upon graduation, she clerked for U.S. District Judge Joe E. Estes from 1970 to 1972.
In 1972, Ms. Miers became the first woman hired at Dallas’s Locke Purnell Rain Harrell.
In March 1996, her colleagues elected her the first female President of Locke, Purnell, Rain & Harrell, at that time a firm of about 200 lawyers. She became the first female to lead a Texas firm of that size.
Locke, Purnell eventually merged with a Houston firm and became Locke Liddell & Sapp, LLP, where Ms. Miers became Co-Managing Partner and helped manage an over-400-lawyer firm.
Ms. Miers had a very distinguished career as a trial litigator, representing such clients as Microsoft, Walt Disney Co. and SunGard Data Systems Inc.
Throughout her career, she has been very active in the legal community and has blazed a trail for other women to follow.
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Justin
Bush just nominated a former board member of EXODUS Minisitries, http://www.exodus-international.org/, the anti-gay “religious” organization :
http://pview.findlaw.com/view/2172806_1?&channel=LP
2 - Eric Olsen
very interesting information, thanks Justin - I am certain much will be made of this
3 - Nancy
Another crony with no on-the-job experience. Anyone but Smirk would learn from their recent bad experiences.
4 - NC
BUSH SUCKS.
5 - NC
As for "Exodus Ministries," I don't think that's one she worked for. There's another organization by that name in Texas (where Miers is from) which works with convicts.
Way to jump to conclusions, though, Blogcritics!
6 - Phillip Winn
NC, 'Blogcritics' didn't jump to conclusions, a commenter named 'Justin' did.
The program for ex-offenders is called Exodus Ministry, while the "ex-gay" program is called Exodus International. It would seem that the organization for which Ms. Miers was a board member is the former, not the latter.
7 - Phillip Winn
Nancy, do you know what percentage of supreme court justices have previously been judges (aka 'on-the-job experience')?
Nominating someone who was specifically suggested by the leading Democrat in the Senate seems like a shrewd political move, not easy crony-ism.
8 - NC
Justin jumped to a conclusion and Eric accepted it at face value. One Blogcritic + another Blogcritic = two Blogcritics. Plural.
9 - Eric Olsen
the "much that would be made of it" was that it was refuted - more interestingly, where did Justin get this incorrect information?
10 - NC
There are many reasons to dislike this pick but lack of judicial experience isn't one of them. John Marshall wasn't a judge before he became a Justice. Neither was Felix Frankfurter. Neither was Rehnquist. Neither, I believe, were Louis Brandeis or Byron White. There are others. John Roberts was only a judge for two years before being nominated to the Court.
It's the quality of the nominee's intellect that matters, not his/her resume. There's nothing about Miers that makes me think her intellect is more impressive than that of several dozen other conservatives judges and scholars.
11 - Eric Olsen
why was she selected? 1) she's a woman 2) she's a Bush loyalist 3) she doesn't have a judicial track record
12 - NC
If we've reached the point where having served on the bench is a strike against a nominee, then the confirmation process is so broken and backward that we need to start thinking about a constitutional amendment to change it. It's especially silly of Bush to worry about a paper trail in this case, considering that Miers apparently lobbied the ABA in the 1990s to put its stance on abortion to a vote of the members in hopes of getting it changed. This will certainly come up at the hearings, so what, precisely, does the lack of a paper trail do in this case to help her duck abortion questions?
Addendum to my previous comment: liberal war horses Earl Warren and William O. Douglas were both appointed to the Court without having served as judges beforehand. Hugo Black, their colleague, did have a tiny bit of judicial experience when he was named to the Court -- but only as a police court judge in Alabama when he was in his twenties.
13 - DJRadiohead
I think it is a shame that information has turned into a weapon. Judges with any hope of ascending to the Supreme Court must now realize the value of detailed opinions has diminished. Ultimately, we are not well served by the tone of the hearings - regardless of which party is doing to the nominating.
14 - Eric Olsen
further complicating the process is that it is not at all unusual for justices to turn out not as they appeared once they get to the bench
15 - Bob A. Booey
I expect a confirmation fight that will hinge upon how she performs in the hearings.
She's too inexperienced, too political, and too close to Bush.
Her academic and professional background is likely the least impressive in the history of the Court.
And there are serious doubts about how objective she could be given her personal ties to and employment by the President over the years.
She's not O'Connor, but that's the argument people will make for her. The Senate wanted a woman, but did they want THIS woman?
I think she'll ultimately be approved because Senators on the fence will suspect she'd be better than the alternative, an ideologue like Luttig or someone controversial and political like Gonzales (the devil you know).
This is both an uninspired but also safe pick for Bush. He knows she'll vote in accordance with his views and knows her personally. In some ways, she'd be a more reliable conservative than the other conservative judges who've been mentioned as possible nominees since she doesn't have an extensive background in case law or judicial philosophy to get in the way of her rulings.
She's just not qualified.
That is all.
16 - Eric Olsen
she's seems to be more centrist than was anticipated from this nomination
17 - Bob A. Booey
Well how would we know, Olsen? She's never ruled on a case and she's only worked as a bureaucrat or government lawyer. Hopefully there are some memos that can be gone over or something and some record of the positions she took as a candidate running for office.
We can't assume she's a centrist because we haven't heard of her and because she seems like a nice lady.
Right now, people can only speculate about which organizations she's belonged to and who she worked for.
That is all.
18 - Eric Olsen
UPDATED - see above
19 - Nancy
I'm aware many people were not judges before they joined the SC, but they generally had fairly extensive experience. This woman's only virtues seem to be that she was Smirk's personal lawyer, & when he says jump she says how high.
20 - Eric Olsen
see the Findlaw link in comment 1 for a list of organizations and the like - Justin just got the wrong "Exodus"
21 - Bob A. Booey
When I heard that Bush had consulted 70+ Senators this week (against his usual style), I knew he wouldn't be able to go all-out and fight a war over a conservative ideologue like Luttig.
Bush made this calculation based on the knowledge that his political capital was limited and that it wasn't worth an extended fight.
If Reid supports her, she's as good as in. She'll get in with more votes than Roberts -- I revise my statement after learning that Reid suggested her.
But I see no evidence she can be objective towards administration policies the next three years or that she's a moderate other than a campaign donation to Gore.
That is all.
22 - Eric Olsen
Did Thomas or Scalia donate to Gore?
23 - Michael J. West
I see no evidence she can be objective towards administration policies the next three years or that she's a moderate other than a campaign donation to Gore.
Sure, but there's no evidence of the opposite, either. That's really the whole problem, isn't it?
24 - Eric Olsen
she is tabula rasa, almost zen-like in her silence
25 - Baronius
This is why the Supreme Court has leaned liberal over the last 50 years: Democratic presidents nominate leftward justices 100% of the time, Republican presidents nominate rightward justices 50% of the time. Whatever party you support, you've got to admit that Clinton's nominees have reflected his party's legal beliefs. Name a recent Republican's nominees who have.
I've been pleasantly surprised before, by Thomas. (That gives you an idea of my beliefs.) There was little documentation to support the stand that he had a strong legal mind. It's fair to say that his color played a role in his nomination. But I've found that when Scalia, Rhenquist, and Thomas disagree, Thomas has the better reasoning.
Why should I think that Miers will be a good justice? There are three resume items which suggest qualification for the Supreme Court: appeals justice, law school professor, and lottery commissioner. She only has one.
Wait, lottery commissioner? That's not a qualification!