Federal Judiciary

Chavez on Judicial Nominations

By AndrewHyman

Linda Chavez has a May 30 column about picking judges. Here's a sample:

Ironically, the only candidate whose primary concern is the law is the one candidate who isn't a lawyer: John McCain. He says he wants ?jurists of the highest caliber, who know their own minds, and know the law, and know the difference." Perhaps it takes the humility of one who hasn't gone to law school to hold the law in such high esteem. More likely, it's respect for the democratic process by which the people choose lawmakers. In McCain's view, it's the role of the Legislature -- made up of the people's elected representatives -- to write laws. If the people don't like the laws their representatives make, they can pick new legislators, but neither the people nor legislators should rely on judges to rewrite those laws for them.

It's impossible to predict a future president's judicial picks, but it's an almost certain bet that a President Obama (or Clinton) would choose judges who share their expansive view of judicial power while a President McCain would choose more humble judges who understand the limits of that power. What remains is for the voters to decide how much power they are willing to turn over to unelected men and women with lifetime tenure -- and pick their president accordingly.

It's too bad this is such a big issue. Any responsible person should realize that we're better off living in a democracy than in a judicial dictatorship, and yet many people prefer the latter these days. Anything to get one's way, I suppose.

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Full post as published by ConfirmThem on May 30, 2008 (boomark / email).