Storming the 4th Circuit

[Cherchez la Femme]

By J. Harvie Wilkinson III
Friday, January 23, 2009; Page A15
Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/22/AR2009012202842.html


So the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit is set for a takeover. Popular commentary has it that the court, on which I serve, is a fortress or bastion or citadel of conservatism. Discussion of coming changes suggests more the fruits of a successful military campaign than the result of an election giving our new president the right to nominate members to a judicial body.

This is all understandable -- to a point. Victory is exhilarating. There are no Supreme Court vacancies. With four vacancies on our 15-member court, the 4th Circuit may be the best game in town. With the new numbers in the Senate, the temptation is there to go for an ideological makeover.

Yet the tempting course would prove a misguided one. Of course there will be change, as there should be after every presidential election. While no two judges will ever agree on everything (regardless of who appointed them), the differences between appointees of Republican and Democratic administrations can be important. "I don't understand how someone so nice and so smart can be so wrong," I have told my wife. Her reply? "And did you stop to think, Jay, that they could be saying the same -- or worse -- about you?"

But these differences, however significant, are not the whole story. And ideology should not be the foremost criterion for selecting a judge. Many people may not believe it, but judges are not politicians in robes. Many of us found out long ago that we weren't all that good at politics. (I left law school to run for Congress, and the voters sent me back with a spanking.) So we became law nerds. We focused on standards of review, burdens of proof, and somnolent textual and structural discussions. And, when we were at our best, these arcana were not things unto themselves but became connected to the larger purposes of liberty and order that it is our duty to uphold and serve.


~clip~ (Just posted 4 paragraphs, 'a la LBN. Can one copy & paste the entire editorial in this forum?)


Read the entire thing. This is the heighth of hypocrisy and flats of sour grapes, it is astounding.
The comments, however, are great!

[LiberalFighter]

1. If he doesn't want ideology to be a part of the criteria for appointment

I would support any Federalist Society member not be considered.

My records indicate Wilkinson is not a FS member at least.

[Cherchez la Femme]

2. Federalist Society is alarming, true enough

still, anyone making Dub's short list for Chief Supreme Court Justice is still up there in the ultra-negative zone;
in my book, at least.

And, as so many comments there have asked, where were his 'no ideology' pleas all during the Bush administration (along with Bush the First's and Reagan's, who appointed him)?

That he contends that judges should not be political even though he ran for office as a Republican and calls himself now, still a proud Conservative is also mind-boggling.


It's just a :puke:-worthy editorial, all around.