![_It's a Hoot Night: The Kinks at Hotel Vegas [Show Preview]](http://austinist.com/assets_c/2012/05/thekinks-thumb-250x250-716040.jpg)
Love Your Supreme Court...While You Still Can
Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor resigned today, which means that President Bush will have his first opportunity to nominate a new justice. Happy birthday, America!
To give a wildly simplistic snippet of her career, from a political point of view: O’Connor was a Reagan nominee, and hewed to the party line on some conservative pet issues (like flag burning). However, she was more moderate than expected on other screamers, like abortion rights. In 2000, she voted with the majority in Bush v. Gore—the majority of Supreme Court justices, that is. The majority of Americans who chose between Bush v. Gore picked Gore.
Overall, it seems likely that the Bush nominees will be more conservative than O’Connor. (Socially conservative, we should say—we can't consider the deficit-mongering GOP the party of fiscal conservatism.) The Washington Post has has drawn up a list of potential nominees, which features several prominent Texans—no surprise there, given how much importance President Bush places on personal connections and perceived loyalty.
[More after the jump...]
Featured on the list is Sen. John Cornyn, who served as the Texas Attorney General and as a justice on the Texas Supreme Court before being elected to the U.S. Senate in 2002. The Post points out that Cornyn was considered a moderate Republican before going to D.C., at which point he dug in his heels and became one of Bush’s staunchest allies. In fact, as we pointed out last month, one of Cornyn’s most famous actions as a steward of our country’s future was his attempt to destroy one of the last remaining safeguards of minority rights against majority tyranny, rather than see one of Bush’s nominees for a spot on an appellate court be closely questioned by Senate Democrats.
This makes us wonder: What would happen if Cornyn was the nominee, and Senate Democrats tried to filibuster him? Would Cornyn invoke his rights as a senator and file for cloture? Would the debate eventually be punted to the Supreme Court, where O’Connor might cast a decisive vote in favor of a replacement for herself nominated by the man in whose favor she cast a decisive vote in 2000, thus putting him in a position to nominate her replacement? Because that would make a great action thriller, one which could open to a tremendous box office on July 4th weekend next year.
Another situationally ironic candidate for the nomination is Attorney General Alberto Gonzales—when he was named attorney general, we reassured ourselves by thinking that might keep him busily occupied away from the Supreme Court. Gonzales is perhaps best-known for having approved the infamous “torture memo”, which provided a slapdash legal rationale for torturing suspected terrorists. In 2004’s Hamdi vs. Rumsfeld, O’Connor sided with the majority in ruling that a suspected enemy combatant can’t be detained indefinitely at the government’s whim. “A state of war is not a blank check for the president,” wrote O’Connor at the time. In other words, Gonzales would be a completely appropriate and fitting replacement for O’Connor.
If you want to make yourself irritated, refer yourself to the conventional political wisdom, which predicts that the loudest objections to Gonzales’ nomination will come not from Democrats but Republicans, some of whom consider Gonzales soft on abortion.
We hope this is Bush’s last opportunity to nominate a Supreme Court justice, but fear that it won't be, because Chief Justice William Rehnquist is still battling thyroid cancer.
Who would you like to see instated as the next Supreme Court Justice?
