Bench Warfare
Currie, Duncan
Bench Warfare The coming battle over President Bush's Supreme Court nominee. BY DUNCAN CURRIE BY NOW, RALPH NEAS, head of the liberal group People for the American Way (PFAW), must be used to...
...C. Boyden Gray, White House counsel during the first Bush presidency, serves as chairman, while Sean Rushton is the group's executive director...
...Still, the aide adds, "We're starting to see more Republican groups now...
...BY DUNCAN CURRIE BY NOW, RALPH NEAS, head of the liberal group People for the American Way (PFAW), must be used to hyperbolic appraisals of his influence from both friend and foe...
...boasts "about 70 active organizations," and they function together like a well-oiled machine...
...That may be true...
...PFAW and others deny they brandish inordinate control over Senate Democrats...
...I think the plan is there," he says...
...The anti-business groups on the left are very active," says Boyden Gray...
...I would rather not go into this," he says, "for strategic purposes...
...If there's a Supreme Court nomination," Neas predicts, "there'll be many more organizations involved...
...Senator John Cornyn...
...The Washington Post even reported on an "increasingly symbiotic relationship between committee staffers, liberal interest groups and the news media...
...Along with Alliance for Justice chief Nan Aron and Leadership Conference on Civil Rights boss Wade Henderson, Neas is one of Washington's three most powerful liberal activists in the judicial wars...
...The only one Aron doesn't brand filibuster-worthy is Larry Thompson, George W. Bush's former deputy attorney general and now PepsiCo's general counsel...
...Whatever their personal sway over Senate Democrats, Neas, Aron, and Henderson sit atop a vast assembly of nationally known progressive interest groups, including NOW, NARAL, the National Women's Law Center, the NAACP, the AFL-CIO, and the Sierra Club...
...According to Business Week, MoveOnPAC, an outgrowth of the liberal web group, raised at least $1.3 million "nearly overnight" to save the filibuster...
...That may seem a hefty chunk of change...
...The "101st senator," Ted Kennedy once called him on the senate floor...
...Some of the grassroots work falls to wealthy social-conservative groups, such as Concerned Women for America and James Dobson's Focus on the Family, and the Judicial Confirmation Network...
...The Third Circuit's Samuel Alito...
...Over the past few years, Neas says, there has been a coalition meeting "almost every day...
...Bauer regrets that, when it comes to judges, the right appears far less unified than the left...
...But the right's chief grassroots fundraiser on the judicial issue is an organization called "Progress for America," which came into being as a pro-Bush 527 in the 2004 campaign...
...These frequently offer links to op-eds or rebuttals of PFAW's latest mischief...
...Duberstein counted votes, marshaled support, played the PR game, and organized debate prep...
...The first Bush administration, Gray says, recruited ex-Reagan chief of staff Ken Duberstein as a "special government employee" to assist with the confirmations of Justice Thomas and Justice David Souter...
...And many see the ongoing judicial struggle as an extension of the culture wars...
...The Democratic party's having trouble raising money," says veteran conservative leader Gary Bauer...
...The D.C...
...PFAW has published multiple editions of Courting Disaster, its analysis of how a Supreme Court dominated by the likes of Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas might affect American law...
...We communicate with the 'grass tops,'" Rushton explains, "but we have no grassroots ambition at all, and no grassroots component...
...Senator Jon Kyl...
...We're still researching his record," she explains...
...The conservative groups run a conference call every Monday, and a regular Tuesday meeting under the aegis of the Republican National Committee...
...Neas gets a bit cagier when the subject turns to Bush's new addition to the court...
...I've been attacked, I believe, 53 times by the Wall Street Journal editorial board," he laughs, and he deems it a source of "great pride" for PFAW...
...Block Bork" was of course successful, though similar efforts in 1991 failed to keep Justice Thomas off the bench...
...Neas might as well be the one and only Senator...
...They've certainly been at it a lot longer...
...The Fourth Circuit's Harvie Wilkinson...
...Karl [Rove] is a smart guy, so presumably he knows how devastating it would be if the president was unable to get a solid, open conservative on the Supreme Court...
...The business part of our coalition," he says, "all too often is AWOL...
...Says Bauer, "I just don't see much...
...It was the same charge Republicans had made during the Bork hearings...
...As for the Journal's exaggerated estimate of his power, he adds, "I can't think of anything more absurd...
...Aron is much less guarded...
...During the recent filibuster row, Progress for America put out some $3 million worth of ads zinging the Democrats and defending Bush's nominees...
...He would know...
...Rushton pings out daily emails to around 200 Washington "conservative types" (mainly activists and Hill staff) and 800-1,000 journalists...
...But it's also true, as a series of judicial memos leaked in November 2003 showed, that Democratic staffers seem especially interested in how "the groups" will react to a given nominee...
...It may also fight Bush's elevation of Scalia or Thomas to chief justice...
...I tick off a list of possible Supreme Court nominees and ask her whether each would be worthy of a Democratic filibuster...
...Neas takes this all in stride...
...The Fifth Circuit's Emilio Garza...
...In 1987, Neas, Aron, Henderson, and other liberal bigwigs piloted the 300-member "Block Bork" coalition, a motley alliance of local and national advocacy groups...
...As the liberal coalition mobilizes, replenishes its war chest, and gears up for all-out combat, what might the White House do to prepare a response...
...The 10 Democrats on the Judiciary Committee salute and follow [his] orders...
...The Fourth Circuit's Michael Luttig...
...Most prominent of the new conservative groups is the Committee for Justice, whose formation in July 2002 was prompted by the defeat of the Pickering nomination...
...I would hope that a majority of the Senate would defeat a Scalia or a Thomas nomination," Neas says...
...He was everywhere," Gray recalls...
...But Bauer is less certain...
...When it comes to judicial nominations," opined the conservative Wall Street Journal editorial page, "Mr...
...Aron's Alliance and Henderson's Leadership Conference are both umbrella organizations, the latter being the oldest and largest such civil rights association in America...
...And what a battle it will be...
...And it's the same charge they've made since George W. Bush entered the White House in 2001...
...But the liberal organizations seem more numerous, more coordinated, and compelled by a greater sense of urgency...
...The Fifth Circuit's Edith Jones...
...But consider that PFAW and its allies spent around $5 million on a pro-filibuster campaign...
...Last week, while Progress for America trumpeted plans to spend at least $18 million in support of Bush's choice, PFAW named its own Supreme Court Team...
...Not only will the liberal coalition resist adding another conservative to the bench...
...In general, Aron views any anti-^oe nominee to the federal bench as constituting an "extraordinary circumstance...
...The Alliance for Justice, meanwhile, has kept a close eye on the bench through its Judicial Selection Project, which Aron spearheaded in 1985...
...Says a senior GOP Senate aide, "They're much better—and have been much better, historically—at revving up their groups, and communicating, and telling senators what they'd like to see done...
...Circuit's John Roberts...
...To be sure, comparable groups on the right provide much of the intellectual firepower in support of Bush's nominees...
...But do they have a strategy...
...During the Thomas hearings, irate Republicans claimed PFAW and the Alliance for Justice were feeding anti-Thomas dirt to the offices of Democratic senators on the Judiciary Committee...
...But that was all just warm-up for the Big One: the fight over the next Supreme Court nominee, which may well come in the fall, should Chief Justice William Rehnquist's health force him to retire...
...Bring in a Supreme Court point man...
...But not these left-wing activist groups...
...Traditionally, the business lobby has shied away from disputes over moral issues such as abortion...
...He needn't be so modest...
...According to Neas, the coalition Duncan Currie is a reporter at THE WEEKLY STANDARD...
...But if not, PFAW would support Democrats' "using any parliamentary option at their disposal, including the filibuster," to block a Scalia/Thomas ascension...
...The coalition's network of some 70 active groups may soon balloon...
...The steering committee meets "at least once a week," as do various legislative and legal task forces...
...Both groups have provided exhaustive research on such appellate court picks as Charles Pickering, Miguel Estrada, and Priscilla Owen...
...And coalition members are in daily communication by phone...
...Washington lawyer Miguel Estrada...
...PFAW and the Alliance for Justice have done much of the intellectual spadework for those who are mounting the opposition to President Bush's more conservative judicial nominees...
...But along with PFAW, they're also the principal helmsmen of the Coalition for a Fair and Independent Judiciary...
...Gray, who has close ties to Karl Rove and GOP Senate leader Bill Frist, expects the current Bush White House to replicate that strategy...
...And those staffers rely heavily on the opposition research of PFAW in particular...
...Like Neas, she'd back a filibuster of Scalia or Thomas's elevation to chief justice...
...Nevertheless, he and Rushton both expect the National Association of Manufacturers to play a significant role in any Supreme Court battle...
...The pro-business groups on the other side are not...
Vol. 10 • June 2005 • No. 39
