Who is John G. Roberts Jr and why should we care

[DoYouEverWonder]

The media keeps presenting this fellow has a sort of blank slate, which he is not, with the excuse that he's only been on the bench for two years and therefore doesn't have much of a record.

I thought it might be a good idea to try to compile whatever we can find on him and put it together in one place. So far what I have found is not reassuring to say the least.





Here's a record of his campaign contributions. The one that is of most concern is the $1000 he gave to the Bush Recount effort in 2000. I guess we now know which way he would vote if the SC ever has to select a president again. There is also rumors that he worked behind the scenes in FL helping the Bush team in FL? I'm still looking for confirmation.

John G. Roberts, Jr., the Hogan & Hartson partner nominated for the DC Circuit, also donated $1000 to Bush -- this really is starting to look like a cover charge -- with $3000 to other Republicans and $3900 to Hogan & Hartson's PAC. The PAC gave $136,000, aside from individual donations, and $30,000 in soft money. Roberts then donated $1000 to the Bush recount effort. Hogan & Hartson clients include Mobil Oil Corporation, 3M, and Hartford Accident & Indemnity.

http://www.buzzflash.com/contributors/2002/01/012902_Checkbooks_and_Balances.html

Roberts argued for blockading abortion clinics.

Clinic blockade case argued

Copyright Times Publishing Co. Oct 7, 1992

The Bush administration renewed its argument before the Supreme Court on Tuesday that federal judges do not have jurisdiction to stop Operation Rescue and other anti-abortion groups from trying to shut down abortion clinics through blockades and mass demonstrations.

Deputy Solicitor General John G. Roberts Jr. argued that the Ku Klux Klan Act, a Reconstruction-era federal civil-rights law that federal judges across the country have invoked as the basis for injunctions to bar the protests, does not apply to actions motivated by opposition to abortion.

The Ku Klux Klan Act, enacted in 1871 to protect the newly freed blacks in the South from mob violence by white racists, prohibits conspiracies to deprive people of their civil rights.

The Supreme Court has interpreted the law to apply only to conspiracies aimed at a particular group or "class" of people and motivated by a "discriminatory animus" against that class.

http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/sptimes/54277246.html?MAC=107bb209117dc38c06dfc103f399d7b&did=54277246&FMT=FT&FMTS=FT&date=Oct+7%2C+1992&author=&pub=St.+Petersburg+Times&printformat=&desc=Clinic+blockade+case+argued+at+high+court

Roberts was a former deputy solicitor under Kenneth Starr.

Also nominated to the appeals courts, which are the regional U.S. courts that serve as last stop before the U.S. Supreme Court, were: U.S. District Judge Edith Brown Clement and Texas Supreme Court Justice Priscilla Richman Owen to the 5th Circuit; Ohio Supreme Court Justice Deborah L. Cook to the 6th Circuit; Washington area attorney John G. Roberts Jr., a former deputy solicitor under Kenneth Starr, to the D.C. Circuit, and U.S. District Judge Dennis W. Shedd to the 4th Circuit.

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4155/is_20010510/ai_n13903866

Roberts' wife is a pro-life activist. I think we can assume that he is too. Even though he has flip flopped on his stated opinion regarding Roe v Wade.

Roberts has generally avoided weighing in on disputed social issues. Abortion rights groups, however, have pointed out that Roberts tried during his days as a lawyer in the first Bush administration to overturn Roe v. Wade. Roberts did help write a brief that stated "we continue to believe that Roe was wrongly decided and should be overruled." Yet when pressed during his 2003 confirmation hearing for his own views on the matter, Roberts said: "Roe v. Wade is the settled law of the land. ... There's nothing in my personal views that would prevent me from fully and faithfully applying that precedent." Some liberals will argue that he now can vote to overturn that decision if confirmed, but Roberts is not one of those candidates who have been openly hostile to the Roe decision. That said, RedState.org notes that Roberts is married to the Executive Vice President of Feminists for Life, giving us some indication of his own personal views on the matter.

http://www.orlandoreport.com/profiles/Supreme_Court/roberts.htm

On one hand Roberts thinks Roe v Wade should be overturned, then he flip flops and that he would uphold the precedent. Which one is it Roberts? You can't have it both ways.

He signed on many conservative briefs, including arguing for overturning Roe v. Wade. Roberts co-wrote a brief: ''We continue to believe that Roe was wrongly decided and should be overruled." Pressed during his 2003 confirmation hearing for his own views, Roberts said: ''Roe v. Wade is the settled law of the land. . . . There's nothing in my personal views that would prevent me from fully and faithfully applying that precedent."

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2005/07/20/john_glover_roberts_jr/

Roberts reversed a lower court's ruling that military tribunals to try terrorist detainees violated the Geneva Convention.

In a recent decision on July 15, 2005, Roberts joined with two other judges of the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia to rule that the Bush administration's plan to convene military tribunals to try terrorist detainees at the U.S. Naval Base on Guantanamo Bay is constitutional, a decision that promises to jump-start a controversial and historic process that has been waylaid for eight months by legal challenges. The decision reversed a lower court's ruling that the tribunals violated the Geneva Convention and concluded instead that the Bush administration has the authority to bring detainees before tribunals, or military commissions, on war crimes charges. The commissions would mark the first time since the close of World War II that prisoners of war and enemy combatants would be tried in a quasi-military court-martial setting. The Supreme Court last year ruled that detainees should be given some kind of due process, but was vague about what type.

http://www.orlandoreport.com/profiles/Supreme_Court/roberts.htm

This is just the tip of the iceburg has they say. We can continue to add to this list has we find out more.

[CWebster]

1. He was one of Bush's lawyers in the Fla vote recount

that put Bush in office.

Oh, and he meets with Santorum's gushing approval. That says enough.

[leftchick]

2. Another Judge for 'Mountaintop Mining'....

<snip>

Another Bush judicial appointee with experience representing the mining industry is John G. Roberts, Jr., a former colleague of George Miller's at the Hogan & Hartson law and lobbying firm. Roberts was one of the co-authors of Miller’s amicus brief on behalf of the National Mining Association’s challenge to the government ban on ‘mountaintop removal’. In 2003, Roberts was confirmed to the powerful D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, where earlier this year he ruled against environmentalists who were pushing for more restrictive government regulations of copper smelters--many of whom are members of the National Mining Association that Roberts once represented. As a lobbyist in the 1990s, Roberts worked on behalf of the peanut industry, pushing federal legislation that maintained government subsidies which the GAO estimated cost consumers $500 million a year. Agricultural and mining interests are often involved in regulatory cases that come before the DC Circuit Court where Roberts now sits.

http://courtinginfluence.net/stories_print.php?id=7

[DoYouEverWonder]

3. Here's a few more items for the list

Roberts defended the Alaska sex offender registry.

The Alaska sex offender registry, passed in 1994, requires anyone convicted of sex offenses after 1984 to provide a name, address, place of employment, vehicle information, photographs, and fingerprints, and they must update that information every 90 days for life if convicted for a serious offense. They must provide updates annually for 15 years if convicted of a lesser offense. The offenders in question, John Does 1 and 2, argue that having committed their crimes and served their sentences before the law was enacted, they are being subject to an unconstitutional "ex post facto" law that criminally punishes conduct occurring before the law even existed. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals agreed.

<snip>

In the Alaska case, Justice Anthony Kennedy points out at least eight times that "affirmatively" forcing someone to go to the police station four times a year, "presenting myself to a policeman," which is "degrading," is both burdensome and has "no analog" in the law. John Roberts, arguing in defense of the Alaska registry, responds that being burdensome does not make a law "punishment" (as opposed to mere civil regulation) for purposes of triggering the ex post facto rule.

http://slate.msn.com/id/2073942/

Here's a link to the PDF file for Roberts rulings in the case where more than two thousand victims, family members of victims or representatives of victims of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, seek to hold accountable the persons and entities that funded and supported the international terrorist organization known as al Qaeda, which is now generally understood to have carried out the attacks. Plaintiffs have sued nearly two hundred entities or persons -- governments, government agencies, banks, charitable foundations, and individuals, including members of the Saudi royal family -- broadly alleging that each of them, in one way or another, directly or indirectly, provided material support, aided and abetted, or conspired with the terrorists who perpetrated the attacks.

http://www.dcd.uscourts.gov/02-1616memop.pdf

[katmondoo]

4. His eyes look weird

[DoYouEverWonder]

5. That's why I posted the pic

He's got scary crazy eyes.

[DoYouEverWonder]

6. kick