Samuel Alito Senate Confirmation Hearings - A Roundup

Top blogs worth following for 'blow-by-blow' coverage of the hearings of Judge Samuel Alito: Bench Memos (National Review); Confirm Them; Professor Bainbridge and Michelle Malkin.

A Roundup - (Mostly Humorous) Highlights and coverage . . .

• Wendy Long (Bench Memos) on Ted Kennedy's Elitist Sexist Club:

  Let me get this straight: Sam Alito, who worked hard in New Jersey public schools, got into Princeton on his own merits, took his meals in the coed dining hall and had nothing to do with the all-male Princeton eating clubs, is getting guff from Ted Kennedy, Boston elitist who got into (and stayed into) Harvard on, um, other people's merits, and who just a few months ago reconfirmed his membership in the Owl Club, which according to the Washington Times has “long been reviled on campus as sexist and elitist, and in 1984, was booted from the university for violating federal anti-discrimination laws.”

• Senator Kennedy badgers the witness over Vanguard. For more about this case, see "Kennedy vs. Alito by Proxy", Edward Whelan. National Review Online Nov. 15, 2005.

• Wendy Long (Bench Memos) on Dem Disrespect:

  I'm sitting in the hearing room, in back of an impressive and historic panel of federal Circuit Court of Appeals judges who have served with Judge Alito. . . . The only Democrat Senators who bothered to stay on the dais are Leahy and Feinstein. Almost all the Republicans are there. Most notably, Senator Chuck Schumer got up and left right before the judges began to speak. Not only do they not care about the Judges' testimony, apparently, they don't even care about the disrespect for these judges that the bench of empty seats on the Democrat side bespeaks.

  More from Michelle Malkin, on "a woman the Dems don't want to hear": U.S. Appeals Court Judge (and Clinton apointee) Maryanne Trump Barry.

• "I take umbrage at your telling me what I received. I don't mind your telling me what you mailed. But there's a big difference between what's mailed and what's received. And you know that." -- Sen. Arlen Specter and Sen. Kennedy had a little spat, or clash of the windbags, as Michelle Malkin puts it. Check out the video, it's very amusing.

• Jonathan Adler Bench Memos) on Administrative Law:

  Senator Kennedy's questioning this morning about the unitary executive and administrative agencies reveals a profound misunderstanding of bedrock principles of administrative law, including the difference between agencies that are a part of the executive (such as the EPA, FWS, APHIS, etc.) and independent agencies (FTC, CPSC, FCC, Federal Reserve). Judge Alito patiently tried to explain this to him, to no avail. As it happens, I'm in the midst of grading my students' administrative law exams. Based upon his comments this morning, Senator Kennedy would easily hold down the bottom of the curve.

• Reportedly the Senators' bullying attempt to paint Alito as a racist and a sexist provoked his wife to leave the room in tears -- blogger Captain's Quarters responds:

  The smear tactics trotted out to derail the nomination of Judge Alito over the past few weeks had hit their nadir when Ted Kennedy demanded a subpoena for the William Rusher papers to determine whether the National Review publisher may have written something about CAP and Alito. Never mind that this was an entirely off-subject line of questioning from the beginning; Alito's own hiring record proved that he has no animus towards equal opportunity for women or minorities, and the Prospect itself had a woman (Laura Ingraham) and a minority (Dinesh D'Souza) as its editors in chief. Never mind that Alito has had decades of dedicated public service with an impeccable record of excellence, including fifteen years on the appellate court. Never mind that he has not been called before Congress to defend himself on charges but for confirmation to move up to the Supreme Court by invitation of the President.

  When what should be a simple confirmation process reduces family members to tears, it shows that one party has degenerated into a secular Inquisition. And let me remind you that it was this party that, on more than one occasion, elected a former Klansman to the post of Majority Leader -- a man who as recently as three years ago defended the use of the "n-word".

  In fact, most of the Senators from that caucus are responsible for that election of Byrd to his leadership posts.

  I would assume that under their definition, Leahy, Kennedy, Biden, and perhaps Schumer are all racists and genocidists. They're certainly tied much closer to those beliefs than Samuel Alito, and I invite them to explain the difference to the American people.

• Democrats suspicious of Alito's views on Roe v. Wade? -- Timothy P. Carney is compiling list of Pro-choice Criticisms of Roe.

• But Enough About You, Judge; Let's Hear What I Have to Say, by Elizabeth Bumiller. New York Times January 11, 2006:

  "I understand, Judge, I am the only one standing between you and lunch, so I'll try to make this painless," he began, with some promise.

  Mr. Biden then dived into a soliloquy on Judge Alito's failure to recuse himself from cases involving the Vanguard mutual fund company, which managed the judge's investments. After 2 minutes 50 seconds - short for the senator - Mr. Biden did appear to veer toward a question, but abandoned it to cite Judge Alito's membership in a conservative Princeton alumni group. Mr. Biden discoursed on that for a moment, then interrupted himself with an aside about his son who "ended up going to that other university, the University of Pennsylvania."

  Judge Alito, who had been sitting without expression through Mr. Biden's musings, interrupted the senator midword, got out three sentences, then settled in for nearly 26 minutes more of Mr. Biden, with the senator doing most of the talking. With less than a minute to spare, Mr. Biden concluded, thanked Judge Alito for "being responsive," then said to Mr. Specter that "I want to note that for maybe the first time in history, Biden is 40 seconds under his time."

• Michael Novak on the Alito Hearings:

  How old and out-of-date and empty of real ideas — not to say connection to reality — Kennedy, Biden, Leahy, Durbin, and, above all, Schumer seemed. They know they have to do what they are doing, but they know their efforts are for nothing, and their words are making hollow echoes. Even their indignation seems forced and falls swiftly flat.

  The pompous rhetorical indignation of Kennedy has become merely pathetic. He was once a heroic figure, but he now seems like the lion of Alice in Wonderland — threadbare, tame, and roaring every so often only out of nostalgic habit. Chuck Schumer drones on like a little spoiled boy who becomes a schoolyard bully just by his superior tone of voice, boring in upon others, coercing them verbally, trying to make them feel as worthless as in his mind they are.

  It is painful to watch the ruin of a great party. A great party has come to this.
  

  And most of it happened because of commitment to a policy that cannot be maintained without lies and malicious euphemisms. That is, the killing of innocents in what is supposed to be the most welcoming, safest place on earth — a mother's womb.

• Richard Reeb (blogging for Claremont Review's The Remedy) observed Senator Brownback's taking on two sacred cows: "super (dooper?) precedents" and Roe v. Wade, in his questioning of Alito.

• Joe Biden, Time Traveler (via Confirm Them).
  

• Scorecard: Judge Samuel A. Alito Answered A Higher Percentage (95%) Of Questions On His Opening Day Of Questioning Than Justices John Roberts (89%) Or Ruth Bader Ginsburg (79%) Did During Their Full Confirmation Hearings.

• Professor Bainbridge comes to an Alito Epiphany:

  After catching up on the first day of the Alito hearings, one conclusion seems inescapable; namely, that Alito is more machine now than man; twisted and evil. He yearns to take liberals, women, minorities, gays, small children, and puppies to the Dune Sea, and cast them into the pit of Carkoon, the nesting place of the all-powerful Sarlaac, in whose belly they will find a new definition of pain and suffering as they are slowly digested over a thousand years. (Or maybe it's the slavering maw of Cthulhu the Great. I zoned out for awhile during Durbin's opening remarks.)

Transcripts

• Senate Confirmation Hearings: Day 1 January 9, 2006.
• Senate Confirmation Hearings: Day 2 January 10, 2006.
• Senate Confirmation Hearings: Day 3 January 11, 2006.
• Senate Confirmation Hearings: Day 4 January 12, 2006.

Alito would give U.S. high court Catholic majority

From Reuters:

Roman Catholics would be the majority on the U.S. Supreme Court for the first time if Samuel Alito is confirmed -- a historically remarkable prospect in a country where "papists" were once taught in state schools that their faith was a lie.

But so far the development has passed for little more than a curiosity, reflecting how politics trumps religion when it comes to appointments to America's highest court, experts say.

Alito and the Catholics already on the court -- John Roberts, Anthony Kennedy, Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas -- appear to share many conservative views held by evangelical Protestants, a group historically suspicious of Rome and its hierarchical church.

The prospect of a Catholic court majority "is a credit to the evolution of America," said Julie Fenster, co-author of "Parish Priest," a book recently published by William Morrow about the Catholic priest who founded the Knights of Columbus.

"I don't think Catholics here realise how much their antecedents had to take on the chin in terms of job discrimination, public jeering -- in some towns it was hard to walk down the street without being shouted at," she said.

"And in the (public) schools you had to accept that your children would be taught from textbooks that said Catholicism was wrong," Fenster said.

CONSTITUTION OR POPE?

Historically, many Americans questioned whether Roman Catholics could uphold the U.S. constitution, or whether they were obligated to follow the dictates of the Pope while in office. There has been only one Roman Catholic U.S. president, John F. Kennedy, elected in 1960.

But evangelical Protestants seem so far to be embracing Alito, unlike President George W. Bush's last court nominee, Harriet Miers.

"Look at how the evangelical right responded to one of its own when it came to Harriet Miers," said Brent Walker, executive director of the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty.

Bush nominated Miers, a fellow conservative Christian, last year but she withdrew under fierce attack from conservatives who questioned her credentials and commitment to conservative ideology.

"It just shows you how it's mostly about ideology and not about religion," added Walker, whose Washington-based coalition of 14 Baptist bodies works for religious liberty causes.

"I think it's good that not a lot is being made of it. Generally religion is not a very good predictor of how one will decide cases," he added, noting that former justice William Brennan, also a Catholic, was a liberal.

Of the remaining justices, Stephen Breyer and Ruth Ginsburg are Jewish, David Souter is Episcopalian and John Paul Stevens is Protestant.

"During much of 20th Century there was a Catholic seat and a Jewish seat (on the court). Anything but one Catholic would have created a lot of consternation among Protestants and evangelicals," said Martin Flaherty, a Fordham Law School professor who once clerked for former Supreme Court Justice Byron White.

REPRESENT THE COUNTRY

Alito and the others appear to have far more things in common than differences, he said.

"On some level the court should be very roughly representative of the country. If you have not just a majority but (one) from a certain wing of a denomination you wonder if the court does represent the country," he added.

About one in four Americans say they are Roman Catholic, making the church by far the largest single U.S. denomination. There is no monolithic political philosophy marking the faith, despite the church's strong official opposition to abortion, a position widely shared by conservative evangelical Christians.

About 52 percent of Americans say they are Protestants, although mainline churches are losing members as the evangelical movement grows. Less than 2 percent of the U.S. population is Jewish.

One anomaly is that 20 percent of U.S. Catholics are Hispanic, yet none of the five who would be on the court is, noted Tom Smith, director of the General Social Survey at the National Opinion Research Centre in Chicago.

Religion "has pretty much become passe" as an issue, he suggested, except to the degree that it becomes a hot potato in nearly every U.S. presidential campaign when candidates define their stand on abortion.

Opposition to Alito has come from groups worried that the court would eliminate the right to abortion. Legal Momentum, a woman's legal rights group, said it feared putting Alito on the court would be "adversarial to a woman's right to choose."

Alito's Opening Statement: You Judge

Below, for your consideration, is the fine opening statement by Judge Alito yesterday as his Senate confirmation hearings began. In my own parish, we have been praying regularly in our Mass petitions for the confirmation of a pro-life Supreme Court justice. I believe Alito is that man. In addition, everything that I have read about him paints the picture of an extremely intelligent but humble and quiet man. That is also quite important. The profession I was trained in, the law, in my opinion, disproportionately attracts what I call "hustlers," that is, mediocre individuals with an inordinate desire for self-aggrandizement. So it is a delight to see someone so different in the spotlight: someone both of dazzling intellect and of even more dazzling, because so much more significant, humility. Here is his statement with my additions in brackets and with bold emphasis added:

SAMUEL ALITO. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I am deeply honored to appear before you. I’m deeply honored to have been nominated for a position on the Supreme Court and I am humbled to have been nominated for the seat that is now held by Justice O’Connor. Justice O’Connor has been a pioneer and her dedicated service on the Supreme Court will never be forgotten and the people of the country certainly owe her a great debt for the service that she has provided.

I’m very thankful to the president for nominating me and I’m also thankful to the members of this committee and many other senators who took time from their busy schedules to meet with me. That was a great honor for me and I appreciate all of the courtesies that were extended to me during those visits. And I want to thank Senator Lautenberg and Governor Whitman [New Jersey officials because Alito is from New Jersey] for coming here today and for their kind introductions.

During the previous weeks an old story about a lawyer who argued a case before the Supreme Court has come to my mind and I thought I might begin this afternoon by sharing that story. The story goes as follows: This was a lawyer who had never argued a case before the court before and when the argument began one of the justices said, How did you get here, meaning how had his case worked its way up through the court system. But the lawyer was rather nervous and he took the question literally and he said — and this was some years ago — he said, I came here on the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. This story has come to my mind in recent weeks because I have often asked myself how in the world did I get here? And I want to try to answer that today and not by saying that I came here on I-95 or on Amtrak.

I am who I am in the first place because of my parents and because of the things that they taught me. And I know from my own experience as a parent that parents probably teach most powerfully not through their words but through their deeds. And my parents taught me through the stories of their lives, and I don’t take any credit for the things that they did or the things that they experienced, but they made a great impression on me.

My father was brought to this country as an infant. He lost his mother as a teenager. He grew up in poverty. Although he graduated at the top of his high school class, he had no money for college and he was set to work in a factory, but at the last minute a kind person in the Trenton area arranged from him to receive a $50 scholarship, and that was enough in those days for him to pay the tuition at a local college and buy one used suit. And that made the difference between his working in a factory and going to college. After he graduated from college, in 1935 in the midst of the Depression, he found that teaching jobs for Italian-Americans were not easy to come by and he had to find other work for a while. But eventually he became a teacher and he served in the Pacific during World War II and he worked, as has been mentioned, for many years in a nonpartisan position for the New Jersey Legislature, which was an institution that he revered. His story is a story that is typical of a lot of Americans, both back in his day and here, and today. And it is a story, as far as I can see it, about the opportunities that our country offers and also about the need for fairness and about hard work and perseverance and that power of a small good deed.

My mother is a first-generation American. Her father worked in the Roebling Steel Mill in Trenton, N.J. Her mother came from a culture in which women generally didn’t even leave the house alone, and yet my mother became the first person in her family to get a college degree. She worked for more than a decade before marrying. She went to New York City to get a master’s degree. And she continued to work as a teacher and a principal until she was forced to retire. And both she and my father instilled in my sister and me a deep love of learning.

I got here, in part, because of the community in which I grew up. It was a warm but definitely an unpretentious down-to-earth community. Most of the adults in the neighborhood were not college graduates. I attended the public schools. In my spare time I played baseball and other sports with my friends. And I have happy memories and strong memories of those days, and good memories of the good sense and the decency of my friends and my neighbors.

And after I graduated from high school, I went a full 12 miles down the road — but really to a different world — when I entered Princeton University. A generation earlier I think that somebody from my background probably would not have felt fully comfortable at a college like Princeton, but by the time I graduated from high school things had changed. And this was a time of great intellectual excitement for me, both college and law school opened up new worlds of ideas. But this was back in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s. It was a time of turmoil at colleges and universities, and I saw some very smart people and very privileged people behaving irresponsibly and I couldn’t help making a contrast between some of the worst of what I saw on the campus and the good sense and the decency of the people back in my own community. I’m here, in part, because of my experiences as a lawyer. I had the good fortune to begin my legal career as a law clerk for a judge who really epitomized open-mindedness and fairness. He read the record in detail on every single case that came before me. He insisted on scrupulously following precedents, both the precedents of the Supreme Court and the decisions of his own court, the Third Circuit. He taught all of his law clerks that every case has to be decided on an individual basis, and he really didn’t have much use for any grand theories. After my clerkship finished, I worked for more than a decade as an attorney in the Department of Justice and I can still remember the day, as an assistant U.S. attorney, when I stood up in court for the first time and I proudly said, My name is Samuel Alito and I represent the United States in this court. It was a great honor for me to have the United States as my client during all of those years. I have been shaped by the experiences of the people who are closest to me; by the things I’ve learned from Martha; by my hopes and my concerns for my children, Philip and Laura; by the experiences of members of my family, who are getting older; by my sister’s experiences as a trial lawyer in a profession that has traditionally been dominated by men. And, of course, I’ve been shaped for the last 15 years by my experiences as a judge of the Court of Appeals. During that time, I have sat on thousands of cases. Somebody mentioned the exact figure this morning. I don’t know what the exact figure is but it is way up in the thousands. And I have written hundreds of opinions. And the members of this committee and the members of their staff who have had the job of reviewing all of those opinions really have my sympathy. I think that may have constituted cruel and unusual punishment.

I’ve learned a lot during my years on the Third Circuit, particularly, I think, about the way in which a judge should go about the work of judging. I’ve learned by doing, by sitting on all of these cases, and I think I’ve also learned from the examples of some really remarkable colleagues. When I became a judge, I stopped being a practicing attorney. And that was a big change in role. The role of a practicing attorney is to achieve a desirable result for the client in the particular case at hand. But a judge can’t think that way. A judge can’t have any agenda. A judge can’t have any preferred outcome in any particular case and a judge certainly doesn’t have a client. The judge’s only obligation, and it’s a solemn obligation, is to the rule of law. And what that means is that in every single case the judge has to do what the law requires.

Good judges develop certain habits of mind. One of those habits of mind is the habit of delaying reaching conclusions until everything has been considered. Good judges are always open to the possibility of changing their minds, based on the next brief that they read or the next argument that’s made by an attorney, who’s appearing before them, or a comment that is made by a colleague during the conference on the case when the judges privately discuss the case.

It’s been a great honor for me to spend my career in public service. It has been a particular honor for me to serve on the Court of Appeals for these past 15 years because it has given me the opportunity to use whatever talent I have to serve my country by upholding the rule of law. And there is nothing that is more important for our republic than the rule of law. No person in this country, no matter how high or powerful, is above the law and no person in this country is beneath the law.

Fifteen years ago, when I was sworn in as a judge of the Court of Appeals, I took an oath. I put my hand on the Bible and I swore that I would administer justice without respect to persons, that I would do equal right to the poor and to the rich, and that I would carry out my duties under the Constitution and the laws of the United States. And that is what I have tried to do, to the very best of my ability, for the past 15 years. And if I am confirmed, I pledge to you that that is what I would do on the Supreme Court. Thank you.

What's the Catholic[?] governor of Wisconsin been up to?

Wisconsin Governor Vetoes Bill to Inform Women of Baby's Abortion Pain

Madison, WI (LifeNews.com) -- Wisconsin Governor Jim Doyle vetoed legislation on Friday that would inform women about the pain their baby would feel during an abortion after 20 weeks of pregnancy. Pro-life groups were disappointed by the veto because the information would be something women wouldn't ordinarily receive from an abortion business. Despite testimony from leading experts in the field, Doyle claimed no proof exists that unborn children feel pain. He said the state legislature should not be allowed to make scientific decisions. Bob Delaporte, a spokesman for Republican Assembly Speaker John Gard told the Associated Press Doyle was guilty of 'ignoring the science on this one.'' Several experts in embryology testified in the state legislature that unborn children have the capacity to feel pain and several told lawmakers that's the case. They include Steven Calvin, perinatologist at the University of Minnesota; Robert J. White, professor of neurosurgery at Case Western University; and Paul Ranalli, neurologist at the University of Toronto. TAKE ACTION: Use the following web site to contact Governor Doyle and tell him he made a wrong decision to veto this bill to protect unborn children and provide women with information they need to make better pregnancy choices: http://www.wisgov.state.wi.us. Read the complete story. "

A law clerk's view of Alito

A law clerk's view of Alito, by Conor Dugan. The Grand Rapids Press. *Those who read Amy Welborn's blog might recognize Conor's name from her comments box).

. . . One of the primary lessons I learned from Judge Alito was about what a judge is and is not in our constitutional system. Much popular thinking about the judicial function holds that the judiciary is just another extension of politics. In this view, a judge ought to attempt to sort out political disputes and to bring to bear his or her personal policy preferences on the law.

. . . Judge Alito taught me that the starting point in any case must be what the law requires. Judge Alito showed me and my fellow clerks that a judge is to put personal ideology aside and ascertain the meaning of the law -- not the meaning he or she wants. A judge has a quite limited role and a solemn responsibility to live up to that role.

As Judge Alito once said, "Most of the labels people use to talk about judges, and the way judges decide (cases), aren't too descriptive. Judges should be judges. They shouldn't be legislators, they shouldn't be administrators."

Daily, I saw Judge Alito working to be a judge -- not a legislator or an administrator. To do this, he worked to understand what the relevant precedents, statutory law, and/or constitutional text required in a given case.

JudgeAlito.Com

Catholics & Homosexuals

In the current atmosphere, the social liberals view Catholics as homophobic as confirmed by the recent decision to bar homosexuals from the ordained priesthood. On the one hand, the pro-gay liberals will never be satisfied until the Catholic Church accepts homosexual acts as legitimate expressions of love. On the other hand, we as Catholics should not let pro-gay liberals set the template for the homosexual issue.

The Catholic template for the homosexual issue is quite different from the caricature fostered by the pro-gay lobby. The Church teaches that the inclination arising from deep-seated homosexual tendences is an objective disorder (Catechism of the Catholic Church [CCC], section 2358). Some will immediately object that what is natural for many individuals cannot be a disorder. But the Church does not base its teaching on the premise that homosexuality is something voluntarily chosen. In fact, the Church admits that the causes of homosexuality remain "largely unexplained" (CCC, 2357). So, if tomorrow, some scientist discovers a genetic basis for homosexuality, the basis of what the Church teaches is unaffected. Homosexuality would then be one among many other genetic disorders in a world shot through with imperfection.

But why is this inclination disordered? The inclination tends toward acts that are gravely evil because they "close the sexual act to the gift of life" (CCC, 2357). This teaching is not unfairly discriminatory because the Catholic Church teaches that even heterosexual acts closed to the gift of life are gravely evil. That is why Christian communities that have abandoned the traditional Christian teaching against contraception find themselves either embracing the gay agenda or vulnerable to logical attack.

The other reason for the grave depravity of homosexual acts is that they "do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity" (CCC, 2357). God made male and female for the fullest intimacy possible (which includes sexual intimacy), not to dwell in parallel universes. Again, this teaching is not discriminatory. The full intimacy, including sexual intimacy, intended by God for male and female requires the complete mutual self-gift found in marriage. That is why fornication among heterosexuals is also gravely evil. Again, those who no longer view fornication as gravely evil will have a hard time logically resisting the gay agenda.

And so to present the Catholic Church as unjustly discriminatory or as homophobic misses the point. The Church has a coherent and logical theology of the body that proposes to all persons that sexual intimacy is for the full mutual and complementary self-gift of marriage open to new life. That teaching is a challenge to both homosexuals and heterosexuals.

But someone can then say that at least chaste heterosexuals have the ability to express their sexual drive in a marriage open to life, while homosexuals do not in the Catholic scheme of things. Here, the celibacy that has been traditional in the Catholic Church shows that there is no unjust discrimination involved. The Church has pointed to the celibate lifestyle as both doable and healthy. Unlike current society, the Church does not view abstaining from sexual acts as necessarily harmful in any way as part of a celibate lifestyle. In fact, the Church views celibacy as an eschatological sign of the full freedom to be available fully to all that will be part of a new earth and a new heaven where there will be no marriage.

At this point, some will then question why bar homosexuals from the ordained celibate priesthood. I have dealt in detail with this particular question in a prior post (11/26/05). What I will say here, solely on a practical level, is that events have conclusively shown that deep-seated homosexual tendencies among ordained priests have created scandal and harm of an immense magnitude and have fostered an image of the ordained priesthood as a "gay profession." So, without addressing here the theological reasons for the ban, the prohibition is a matter of urgent prudence based on undeniable facts. Again, this Catholic stance is not a matter of unjust discrimination.

But what happens to the homosexual struggling to be chaste with no approved sexual outlet? What happens to the heterosexual who is unmarried with no approved sexual outlet? What happens to the married couple that cannot use convenient contraceptives? Now, here comes what I believe is the real scandal that the Church presents to today's culture. Here comes what is really the great offense that sparks Catholic bashing by both heterosexuals and homosexuals: take our difficulties and unite them "to the sacrifice of the Lord's Cross" (CCC, 2358). Yes, we all pull back from the Cross, even though Jesus promises that his yoke is easy and his burden light (Mt 11:30). In the end, we do not want to hear that conversion in the power of the Holy Spirit is the answer. But that is the scandalous answer for all of us regardless of our tendencies or inclinations. That's where the Church is coming from: the Good News that we are promised the power to bear any cross, not just the cross but the power with the cross. It is a challenge to our common tendency to control and organize our lives our way. But there it is. It is a challenge far different from the caricature of the Church that you will find in the media which cannot comprehend that anyone takes that promise of real power seriously.

Catholic Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy Could Dominate Abortion Cases

Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- A University of Alabama law professor says that Justice Anthony Kennedy could become the dominant force on the issue of abortion on the Supreme Court if the Senate approves the nomination of appeals judge Samuel Alito.

On the current court, pro-abortion Justice Sandra Day O'Connor has largely dominated the issue. In 2000, she was the deciding vote and wrote the majority opinion in a case striking down a Nebraska ban on partial-birth abortions.

The decision had negative implications for other state abortion bans and prompted Congressional lawmakers to retool the national partial-birth abortion ban President Bush signed.

Should Alito be approved to replace O'Connor and should be take a pro-life position on abortion cases, as most groups on both sides expect, professor Bryan Fair says pro-abortion Justice Anthony Kennedy could become the driving force.

"Justice Kennedy will be the swing vote in many of the most controversial cases, including parental notification on abortion and other abortion issues that may come up and a wide variety of criminal, federal law and civil rights cases, not only in 2006 but in the next two or three years," Fair predicted.

"The court will have a 4-1-4 alignment with Justices Stevens, Breyer, Ginsburg and Souter on one side and Justices Roberts, Thomas, Scalia and Alito on the other. Kennedy will be the questionable vote in the center," he told the Decatur Daily News.

Where Kennedy stands on abortion cases is somewhat of a question.

Kennedy was expected to be another vote to overturn Roe when he was approved for the court, but he sided with the 6-3 majority in upholding the central tenants of Roe v. Wade. Where he departed from the pro-abortion view was on the Nebraska case. Kennedy joined with former Chief Justice William Rehnquist and pro-life Justices Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia to provide a fourth vote to uphold the pro-life measure.

That dissent puts him in a position to determine the outcome of two key abortion cases the court will consider this term -- a New Hampshire parental notification law and the pro-abortion lawsuit against the national partial-birth abortion ban.

Both cases involve the health exception issue that dominated the debate on the Nebraska ban and Kennedy could easily be the swing vote if he joined new Chief Justice John Roberts, Alito, Thomas and Scalia to uphold the two pro-life laws at issue.

Whether Kennedy would reverse his position on Roe is another question and pro-life advocates don't believe they can count on that. As a result, they're hoping for President Bush to have one more opportunity to appoint a pro-life Supreme Court justice before his final term is over in 2008.

Fair says he thinks that's unlikely, even though the four other pro-abortion members of the court are advancing in age.

Let us pray that Justice Kennedy will make the right decisions.

God loves every embryo, Pope says

From Catholic World News:

Man is the masterpiece of God's creation, and when a chld is conceived, "God already sees the future of that still-unformed embryo," Pope Benedict XVI said at his public audience on December 28.

God recognizes a human being even when the unborn child "is not visible to the eyes of other men," the Holy Father told the 20,000 people who gathered in St. Peter's Square. The Pope's meditation, based on Psalm 138, also reflected his thoughts on the feast of the Holy Innocents.

Psalm 138 extols the power of God the creator, and his knowledge not only of the past and present, "but also the entire range hidden by the future," the Pope observed. God knows and loves the smallest of his creatures, and sees every human being as the finest product of his handiwork, he continued. He added that this theme is particularly appropriate for reflection during the Christmas season, as the world celebrates the God who was "made man for our salvation."

Take note, Catholic politicians who enable the Culture of Death by ignoring this teaching of their Catholic faith!

"The Truth about Torture"

The Evangelical Outpost is hosting an on-line symposium exploring the perspective(s) offered by Christian ethics on the claim that torture is morally permissible under certain circumstances. There are two contributions from Catholics: one from Father John Neuhaus and the other from Rich Vischer. I recommend all the essays.

Benedict XVI on Catholic Politicians

Pope: Catholic Politicians Need to Be Aware of Christian Identity
Urges That They Act Against Injustice and Tyranny

VATICAN CITY, DEC. 18, 2005 (Zenit.org).- One of the challenges facing the Church is to help Catholic politicians recognize their Christian identity and act accordingly, says Benedict XVI.

The Pope addressed this topic Saturday when receiving in audience a third group of Polish bishops making their five-yearly visit to the Holy See.

Recalling the teachings of the Second Vatican Council's constitution "Gaudium et Spes," the Holy Father said: "Those who are suited or can become suited should prepare themselves for the difficult, but at the same time, the very noble art of politics, and should seek to practice this art without regard for their own interests or for material advantages."

Referring to Catholic politicians, he continued: "With integrity and wisdom, they must take action against any form of injustice and tyranny, against arbitrary domination by an individual or a political party and any intolerance.

"They should dedicate themselves to the service of all with sincerity and fairness, indeed, with the charity and fortitude demanded by political life."

To do this, the Pope added, "Christian politicians cannot remain without the help of the Church."

Applying values

"It is a matter of helping them, in a particular manner, be aware of their Christian identity and of the universal moral values that are based in the nature of man, in such a way that, in virtue of a correct conscience, they commit themselves to applying [the values] to civil law, to build a coexistence that respects man in all his dimensions," the Holy Father said.

According to the Pontiff, "It is very important, especially where a pluralistic society prevails, that there be a correct notion of the relationship between the political community and the Church, and a clear distinction between the tasks which Christians undertake, individually or as a group, on their own responsibility as citizens guided by the dictates of a Christian conscience, and the activities which, in union with their pastors, they carry out in the name of the Church."

Benedict XVI dedicated his discourse to the Polish bishops to analyze the role of the laity in the parish, in the movements and in the political sphere, as well as in the realm of volunteer work.

"Why I Am a Brownbacker"

Back in June '05 David explained why Brownback's Devotion To Life, Other Issues Makes Him A Standout Senator.

Steve Dillard from Southern Appeal joins us in explaining Why I am a Brownbacker, citing a Dec. 15th article in SC's The State:

The road to the White House typically leads through Iowa and New Hampshire. For Sen. Sam Brownback, it's led to a desolate refugee camp in the hills of eastern Congo.

The Kansas Republican, a leading social conservative, has made Africa a focal point of his expected bid for his party's 2008 presidential nomination. It's a move that blends his longtime interest in the troubled continent with political savvy. Helping Africans plays well not only with evangelical Christians, Brownback's base, but also with more secular voters who otherwise might be turned off by his hard-line views on abortion and gay marriage. . . .

Brownback sees the movement as a natural evolution, for him and for his party.

"My faith calls to deal with the poor," said Brownback, who was raised an evangelical Christian and converted to Roman Catholicism a few years ago. "And my faith says, as well, if you don't help the poor that is a wrong thing to do."

Get the Rest of the Story.

Bureaucratic Games in South Bend

Recently, I wrote, upon request from a friendly editor at CatholicExchange.com, an article on the "Notre Dame Queer Film Festival" held annually (apparently every February) at the revered South Bend institution (here is the link to the official festival website). The gist of my article was pointing out the abuse of the language involved in associating the phrase "Notre Dame/Our Lady" with something celebrating sodomy as love. Now either the phrase "Notre Dame" really does refer to the Virgin Mary and so we have unadulterated blasphemy; or that phrase's primary meaning is, at least in the decision-making corridors of power at this university, no longer to refer to Mary but to whatever goes on at this particular American educational institution. Either way you slice it, the words "Notre Dame" are being grievously misused: the ancient title for Mary is either being abused blasphemously, or is being deceptively altered in meaning by changing its primary historical reference to Mary.

Now, as we speak, the university is planning and discussing the third annual "Notre Dame Queer Film Festival" for next spring. Under the new presidency of a Fr. Jenkins, the university is apparently trying to find a way to rein in the controversial public relations aspect of this third annual event. But from one recent local news report there appears to be no move afoot to just plain stop hosting the event on university property and to stop several university departments from sponsoring and organizing it (see link). This same news report indicates that an effort may be afoot to try to say that, although hosted at the university, although sponsored and organized by several of the unversity's academic departments, the film series or festival is not "sponsored by the university." Here is an excerpt from a local South Bend newspaper report:

Fort Wayne-South Bend Bishop John D'Arcy sent a letter to the South Bend Tribune on Feb. 10 calling Notre Dame's willingness to host the event "an abuse of academic freedom."

The administration has countered this argument by explaining that the event is not University-sponsored but housed under specific academic departments. Last year, the Festival was sponsored by the FTT Department, the Gay and Lesbian Alumni/ae of the University of Notre Dame and Saint Mary's College (GALA ND/SMC), the English Department, the Anthropology Department, the History Department, the Counseling Center and the Gender Studies Program. Films were shown in the DeBartolo Center for the Performing Arts.

The Observer, 12/6/05, at this link (bold emphasis added).

Now forget about this particular university for a moment. What we see here, as a warning to all of us, is further absurd abuse of language in trying to have us believe that an event taking place on campus and organized by the departments and faculty of the unversity is somehow not "university-sponsored." That is a Machiavellian attempt at hoodwinking people. It is further deceptive abuse of language on top of the original outrage of associating a title of Mary with sodomy.

Let us see: are the football games not "university-sponsored" because organized by the Athletic Dept.? Are Masses not "university-sponsored" because scheduled by campus ministry or the department of residential life? Are diplomas for English majors not "university-sponsored" because certified by the faculty of the English Department? What does this university sponsor? Or does the "university" really exist? It seems to me that we see here an example of the disintegration of the concept of a university, especially a Catholic university, precisely because there is no unifiying and coherent vision of reality. It seems that this problem does not exist at Franciscan University in Steubenville or Ave Maria University in Florida. Those universities are not phantoms so hard to pin down.

Catholics in Congress on Torture

I recommend our readers check out the updated report on Catholics in Congress to see how our Catholic legislators came down on support for the McCain amendment prohibiting torture.

All of the Catholic senators voted for the amendment. Unfortunately, there were 21 Catholics in the House (20 Republicans and one Democrat) who voted against supporting the legislation. Though, I am not accusing these 21 Catholics of being "pro-torture", given the need, at this time in our battle against the terrorists, to reaffirm the United States objections to the the use of torture and the clear teaching of the Catholic Church against it (recently restated by a Vatican official) their "No" votes are IMO not an extension of their Catholic faith.

If it is wrong for pro-abort Catholics to ignore their faith on abortion, is it not wrong for these 21 House members to ignore it on torture?

"The truth is, politics and morality are inseparable. And as morality's foundation is religion, religion and politics are necessarily related. We need religion as a guide.” - Ronald Reagan

Bishop Frederick Henry on Catholic politicians

ZENIT interviews the bishop of the Diocese of Calgary (Alberta, Canada) and he has some direct, coherent things to say about a number of topics, including Catholic politicians who play the "personal beliefs" card:

Q: What would you say about the issue of Catholic politicians voting contrary to Catholic moral principles? How can Catholics be more active in bringing Church teaching into the political scene?

Bishop Henry: Catholic politicians have a duty to be morally coherent. They cannot live as spiritual schizophrenics.

In undertaking any public initiative, it is morally incoherent to leave out completely one's own fundamental convictions, whether for noble or pragmatic reasons. The truth regarding the human person and obligations to uphold this truth do not change when a politician leaves the security of the home and ventures into the secular or political sphere. In all that he or she does, the Catholic politician must work to proclaim and put into action the truth about man and the world.

All Catholic politicians would do well to imitate the example of St. Thomas More, who by his life and death taught that man cannot be separated from God, nor politics from morality. In him, there was no sign of a split between faith and culture, between timeless principles and daily life, but rather a convergence of political commitment.

While serving all, More knew well how to serve his king, that is the state, but above all wanted to serve God: "The king's good servant, but God's first."

When a politician acts in a manner that is scandalous to the faithful, harmful to society, and gravely immoral, I believe that in keeping with Canon 223, "Ecclesiastical authority is entitled to regulate, in view of the common good, the exercise of rights which are proper to Christ's faithful."

Although not the first course of action, this includes the right to holy Communion. For as Canon 915 states: "Those [...] who obstinately persist in manifest grave sin are not to be admitted to holy Communion."

(via Insight Scoop)

Catholic Conservatives Cheerleading Vengeful Warmongering Texans?!?

Stephen Hand (who blogs at TCRMusings) provides a lengthy quote from a soon-to-be-published article by Thomas Herron (Culture Wars) on Catholic Senator Eugene McCarthy (not to be confused with the infamous anti-communist Sen. Joe McCarthy). Stephen's citation contains a passing reference -- I would say mischaracterization -- of this particular blogging collective:

". . . His opposition to the Vietnam War, as he recounts in his The Year of the People (1969) was based on an application of the Catholic Just War Theory to our involvement in Big Muddy. Also the witness of Clergy and Laity Concerned About Vietnam which had been founded in 1966 by a young Lutheran clergyman from Brooklyn, Richard John Neuhaus, was influential in his thinking.

"He knew he was committing political suicide by challenging the vengeful Texan who occupied the White House and going against the leadership of his party which controlled both houses of Congress. But for Eugene McCarthy, a published Commonweal Catholic, the principles he was educated in were of paramount importance. It also didn't hurt that the blue collar French and Irish Catholic voters of Manchester, New Hampshire, confused him with that other Senator McCarthy and asked him why he wasn't talking so much about the Commie Menace anymore . . .

"These days there is a clique of young Catholic conservatives who like to talk about Catholics in the Public Square. In fact that is the name of one of their web sites although it really is little-more than cheer-leading for another vengeful warmongering Texan in the White House and his Catholic servants in Congress like Sam Brownback and Rick Santorum. It would behoove young Catholics who wish to really understand the application of Catholic social principles to American politics to fully examine the life of Eugene J. McCarthy. His roots in Catholic social teachings and the Catholic Revival are deep and we should honor him for his courageous attempt to end the Vietnam War in 1968. We should also ask ourselves why the Catholics in Congress can't bring forth his like to oppose this immoral war. As Patrick Buchanan and Scott McConnell have recently commented in The American Conservative where have you gone Gene McCarthy?"

My colleagues can respond to the charges (as well as the larger issue of Sen. McCarthy as role model) if they wish. But I personally found this characterization amusing, since the focus of this particular blog is by and large the relationship of Catholic legislators to the Church and their fidelity to Catholic teaching -- and to my knowledge, whatever our personal opinions on U.S. foreign policy in Iraq, we've engaged in precious little if any "cheerleading for vengeful warmongering Texans."

Perhaps I may be partly at fault in bringing down the wrath of these critics, having maintained another website and blog devoted to the issue of the war in Iraq and the just war tradition. And while I've never met Thomas Herron personally, I had been chastised previously in the pages of Culture Wars for my "rabid support of the current American occupation of Iraq" and sympathy for "the Jewish tribe," whoever they are (see Response to Thomas J. Herron Against The Grain Sept. 13, 2005 for the sordid details).

Culture Wars, if you can guess, is not very high on my reading list, so I appreciate the kindness of Stephen Hand for bringing this criticism to light.

* * *

Meanwhile, I'd like to take the opportunity to remind our readers that David Schrader has devoted much time and effort in compiling a detailed and very useful report on the Catholics in Congress, based on their voting record on abortion, euthanasia, human cloning, embryonic stem cell research (ESCR), torture, and same-sex marriage (SSM). In defense of Senator Rick Santorum and Senator Brownback, they have commendable records (compare them with some of the other infamous Catholic legislators -- Senators Kennedy and Kerry, for instance), and so I gladly join David in his support.

Real Social Justice

The Sunday N.Y. Times for December 4th had a wonderful column by lawyer and economist Ben Stein celebrating the life of his old friend and mentor economist and Nobel Prize winner Milton Friedman who became famous at the University of Chicago while teaching there from 1946 to 1976. Friedman celebrated the virtues of the free market and is now in his nineties. Yes, he celebrated the virtues of the free market--I still recall my father carrying a copy of Friedman's 1980 bestseller Free to Choose--but Friedman, in my view, is one of the leading proponents of social justice today. Why? Friedman back in the nineteen fifties was, I believe, the first to propose school vouchers as an alternative to the public education monopoly of public money. He is still, in his nineties, crusading for that long overdue social justice reform.

Many fancy themselves great proponents of social justice in our society. In my opinion, the two greatest social justice issues in American society today are ending legal abortion and making school vouchers available to as many parents as possible--in that order. Yet, many who pride themselves on oozing with social compassion for the poor and the weak refuse to attack legal abortion and turn up their noses at school vouchers. In this world, things are not as they appear; and rhetorical self-description is highly suspect.

In his column praising Friedman, Stein gives us a grand example of the deceptive character of our high-flown rhetoric:

In about 1965, the whole world was worshipping at the altar of John F. Kennedy's words, "Ask not what your country can do for you--ask what you can do for your country." Professor Friedman, in his writing, said that neither was a fitting question in a free society. People should be asking what they can do for themselves and their friends and communities, not how they can serve the state or what they could get as wards of the state.

Ben Stein, "On Milton Friedman's Birthday, We Get the Present: Him," N.Y. Times, Sunday, Dec. 4, 2005.

Personally, I never "took" to Kennedy's famous rhetoric from his inaugural speech. I could not quite put my finger on it, but the high-flown phrase, nay command, always seemed empty and vacuous to me: words in search of elusive content, the sort of thing you would expect a politician or an aggressive salesmen to say. Sounds good, but what does he really mean? What is he trying to get me to do? Do I want to do what he is ordering me to do? Is his agenda really the agenda I want? To me, the phrase always seemed more manipulative than enlightening. (By the way, the Ronald Reagan of 1961 also had a similar reaction; he referred pejoratively to Kennedy's rhetoric as "statism," in spite of its glamorous presentation.)

So when I read Friedman's analysis of the absurdity of the Kennedy rhetoric, I can say "Eureka!," like Archimedes of old. The state is not our focus and should not be our focus. Catholic social justice teaching points precisely to what Friedman pointed to: ourselves, our families, our friends, our communities, our civic and cultural associations, our local schools and places of worship. I cannot give my love, affection, and loyalty to the abstract state. My country is not a state; my country, my patria, is the social web of friendship and affection that flourishes well beyond the state and, in many cases, in spite of the state and, nowadays, in great tension with the state. The state is, at its best, merely the framework for all of that to flourish. Our primary affection is not to the necessary and sometimes oppressive framework that is the state but to the content protected by the framework.

For too long, many of us have reflexively fallen for the vacuous rhetoric of those who, in seeking the levers of power over us, give encomiums to the state. For too long, the superficial and deceptive glamour first brought to American politics by Kennedy has clouded reality. That is why today it is still a shock to many that, if we want to look for the real crusaders for social justice, we need to look in some places we may have wrongly viewed as unlikely focuses of compassion. We need to look at those who are willing to address the leading social justice issues of our time: ending legal abortion and putting school vouchers in the hands of as many parents, especially inner city parents, as possible. Surprise of surprises: we do better in embracing social justice by looking to the education reform long proposed by the conservative Jewish economist from Chicago than to the rhetoric of the ostensibly Catholic pol from Boston. But, then again, the truth has a way of surprising us. It's a funny image: maybe the inner city poor should hang a picture of the balding and bespectacled Professor Friedman next to that of the tanned and well-coiffed glamour icon of the sixties!

Note: For the record, I am not aware of Friedman's position on abortion and disagree with Friedman's apparent proposal for drug legalization. But on school vouchers, I am with Friedman all the way. Here is a link to the Friedman Foundation website for the curious.

Another Catholic in the US Senate

Incoming New Jersey governor John Corzine will appoint Representative Robert Menendez to fill his Senate seat. Rep Menendez's voting record is less than stellar:

Voted against:
the Partial Birth Abortion ban
a ban on human cloning
the Unborn Victims of Violence Act
a ban on federally controlled substances for assisted suicide

Voted for:
lifting the ban on abortions in military facilities
funding UNFPA
increasing federal funding of ESCR

I suspect Senator Menendez's voting record will be no different.

If there was any doubt...

...B16 says:

Children Deserve Married Parents and Presents Institution as "Patrimony of Humanity"

VATICAN CITY, DEC. 4, 2005 (Zenit.org).- Children have the right to parents who are married, says Benedict XVI.

The Pope made this point when addressing participants of a conference of presidents of the episcopal commissions in Latin America for the family and for life. The conference Saturday was organized by the Pontifical Council for the Family.

"Children have the right to be born and to grow within a family based on marriage," said the Holy Father, who invited the ecclesial community to "present in all its richness the extraordinary value of marriage that, as a natural institution, is the 'patrimony of humanity.'"

In his address in Spanish, Benedict XVI stated that "the present phenomenon of secularization … hinders the social conscience from properly discovering the identity and mission of the family institution."

In recent times, continued the Pontiff, "unjust laws" have been approved that "are ignorant of the fundamentals of the same."

"New forms of marriage have been proposed, some of them unknown in the cultures of the nations, in which its specific nature is altered," he said in an implicit reference to so-called same-sex marriage.

"Truly, children are the greatest wealth and most appreciated good of the family," the Pope continued. "That is why it is necessary to help all persons to become aware of the intrinsic evil of the crime of abortion that, in attempting against a human life in its beginning, is also an aggression against society itself."

The Church reminds "politicians and lawmakers, as servants of the social good," of their duty "to defend the fundamental right to life, fruit of the love of God," he added.

When this is forgotten, Benedict XVI continued, "the elimination of the embryo or its arbitrary use" is facilitated "in the interest of the progress of science," which without ethics "becomes a threat to the human being himself, being reduced to an object or a mere instrument."

"When these levels are reached," he added, "society itself is offended and its foundations are shaken with all sorts of risks."