Litigation

Crosscurrents of Kagan Hearings Examined

By Peter Hardin

Tea Party, Democratic Party, Republican Party.

All of them figured into the political crosscurrents behind the recently completed confirmation hearings for Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan.  Here are a few of the latest reports about the swirling politics, published as Congress took a recess for the Fourth of July.

A New York Times article discussed the first Supreme Court confirmation hearings of  “the Tea Party era.” When Republican senators asked about the Constitution’s commerce clause and whether she was a “legal progressive,” the article said, the questions were “not just about academic abstractions, but about the very ideas that animate the rebellious, conservative movement.”

In Slate, Dahlia Lithwick contended that Republicans “inadvertently made the case for confirming Elena Kagan” by driving home, with their attacks on Justice Thurgood Marshall, the same message the Democrats wanted to make–”that the court has a critical function to play when the other two branches of government let the American people down.”

Democrats, meanwhile, used a bumper sticker-style headline reading “Kagan for Justice” on a political website to sign up voters and raise money for the Democratic National Committee, the Associated Press reported.

Two more Republican senators, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, announced they would oppose confirmation of President Obama’s U.S. solicitor general to replace Justice John Paul Stevens, according to a CNN article.

A new crop of newspaper editorials favored Kagan, coming from publications including The Washington Post, Philadelphia Inquirer, Toledo Blade, Los Angeles Times, Minneapolis Star Tribune and Gainesville Sun.

If confirmed, Kagan would bring historic gender diversity to the high court. Ciara Torres-Spelliscy of the Brennan Center for Justice took the debate about diversity a step further in a commentary at that group’s blog.

Torres-Spelliscy tackled the “the odd objection that too many Ivy Leaguers will be on the high court” if Kagan is confirmed. Instead, she contended, “If John Roberts is ‘supremely qualified’ because of his Harvard degree, then so too is Elena Kagan.” The Brennan Center is a partner of Justice at Stake.

Justice at Stake covered the Kagan hearings on Twitter, and you can check out the Twitter reports by clicking on http://twitter.com/justicestake. You also can learn more about Kagan from Gavel Grab and from the JAS Replacing Justice Stevens page.

Full post as published by The Gavel on July 05, 2010 (boomark / email).