With President Bush nominating Harriet Miers on Monday to take retiring Sandra Day O'Connor's spot on the Supreme Court, many analysts are focusing the fact that Miers, 60, could ascend to the court without previously being a judge.
According to the White House, 10 of the 34 Justices appointed since 1933, including former Chief Justice Rehnquist and the late Justice Byron White, were appointed from positions within the president's administration.
However, Jonathan Turley, a NBC legal analyst and law professor at George Washington University, notes that Miers' resume is not as impressive as some of her predecessors nominated from non-judiciary positions.
"There have been people who have gone to the court who have not been judges. The difference is that William Rehnquist (the last such justice to be nominated without having been a judge) had served in various high-level positions within the administration," Turley said. "Someone like Abe Fortus, who was the personal attorney to President Johnson had handled an election dispute for Johnson, was one of the most renowned lawyers of his age and had taught at Yale Law School.
"When you look at people like that - even thought they hadn't been on the bench - they were without question on everyone's top list. They were highly qualified," Turley said. "You don't want to be cruel, but these are frank times. We have to be frank over whether this is the person who should be on the court. No one that I know of would have put Harriet Miers on any list for the Court. She just doesn't have the resume to justify such a decision. Being on the Texas Lottery Commission or the Dallas City Council are not the things you look to for a Supreme Court Justice nominee."
Turley said the pick is likely to ruffle feathers on both ends of the political spectrum.
"The people who should be most aggrieved on this are conservatives. The president walked by intellectual leaders on the right -- Michael Luttig, Michael McConnell, Harvie Wilkinson -- people who were considered the bright stars of the conservative right -- and basically picked his personal attorney," Turley noted. "So I think that privately, there will be some grumbling on that side."
The pick, Turley said, is "a serious problem" for Democrats because of the way that party handled the nomination of John Roberts in September.
"People like Senator Leahy created a certain precedent by saying that they would vote for a nominee like John Roberts who refused to answer any sustentative questions," Turley said. "The White House went out and got a clone - somebody who has no paper trail. You're facing now the problem of somebody like Leahy saying 'You know, I accepted non-answers from Roberts but not from you.' Well, where's the principle in that?"
with and can be seen weekdays from 9 a.m.-Noon.
