Jackson Free Press

This Newsweek article has me wondering. Not because I trust its conclusions (it reads like a puff piece), but because I trust its data, its anecdotes. And because, frankly, I was prejudiced against Alito from the beginning due to the predictably unsettling mix of right-wing triumphalism and left-wing panic.

As far as I know, everything I posted in Scalito's Way still applies--but read the Newsweek article for an alternate, and perhaps less selective, view of his judicial history. If the Senate does in fact approve Alito, if we notice a surprising lack of opposition from moderate Republicans and blue dog Democrats, then this article may be a good explanation as to why.

Right-wing politicians and activists exploit our fears. It's naive to pretend that left-wing politicians and activists don't do the same thing. The truth is that Samuel Alito has a pretty scary-looking paper trail in places. But is this proof that he has a scary right-wing agenda, or just that he's so committed to a very apolitical judicial philosophy--which often, but not always, leads to conservative rulings--that he doesn't care how scary his rulings look?

Food for thought. I'm still firmly on the anti- side of the fence, but I'm entertaining some pretty heavy doubts as to whether the transition from Rehnquist and O'Connor to Roberts and Alito will actually represent a significant net shift to the right. Both candidates look more conservative than O'Connor, but less conservative than Rehnquist. This could be a push.

Excerpt:

At Princeton, he avoided the elitist eating clubs, but also the leftists demonstrating against elitism. "Sam was one of those people who decided he was going to get a good education at Princeton and simply ignored those idiots in SDS," says his senior-thesis adviser, professor emeritus Walter Murphy. Alito's "passion," says Murphy, was "logic. He wanted people to argue logically and reasonably." Alito was a student in Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School, a haven for sober-minded policy wonks. In 1972, he wrote a report for a 16-student- member conference on the "boundaries of privacy in American society" that called on legislatures to repeal some laws making homosexuality a crime. The student report was well ahead of the time. But it's hard to say if Alito was reflecting his own view or that of the other students, much less whether his report suggests he would back gay rights as a justice. Apparently, he sounded like a justice to other students. His Princeton yearbook predicted that Alito would "eventually warm a seat on the Supreme Court."

... It is actually possible to paint Alito as a liberal on abortion rights. He struck down restrictions on partial- birth abortions as well as a law putting restrictions on women's receiving Medicaid funds for abortions after rape or incest. In both cases, actually, he was not expressing a personal view on abortion; he was merely following precedent.

Previous Comments

ID

103597

Comment

Try deciphering his stance on Gun Rights, for some light entertainment. If you can make sense of all the cases around it, that is. He doesn't sound like a bad choice, just a strange one. I think overall he was nominated because he "supports precedent" rather than strikes out on new judicial lawgiving.

Author

Ironghost

Date

2005-11-07T08:27:55-06:00

ID

103598

Comment

Seems all over the map; will be doing some more research on him. I don't know if I would try my case to him though: You'll be most interested in these two blawg posts and my online Civil Rights movies: http://christopher-king.blogspot.com/2005/12/todays-naacp-encourages-lynching.html http://nhindymedia.org/newswire/display/3063/index.php First I was an editor/photojournalist/reporter, then my parents, Arthur Ashe and others recommended law school, then I was an Ohio AAG for 3yrs then Civil Rights lawyer for 5yrs. Now my team demystifies the legal process. Movies at: christopherkingesq.com

Author

Christopher King

Date

2005-12-27T21:11:12-06:00

ID

103599

Comment

Mr. King, Welcome to the site. When I flip open my wallet at the grocery store, post office, or anywhere else, the first thing anyone sees is my NAACP card. Most historical accounts of lynchings, as they existed from Reconstruction until the 1960s, are based almost exclusively on the records assembled by the NAACP and the Tuskegee Institute. And I have friends in the NAACP, Mr. King, so you'll excuse me if I'm reticent to say that the organization as a whole promotes "lynching," or "slavery," or should "burn in hell" because of what would be, at worst, mismanagement by the officers of the New Hampshire chapter. I also have a heck of a hard time figuring out what your situation, unjust though it may be, has in common with the Emmett Till case. There are very real Klan murder cases that people on this site are helping to publicize--the unprosecuted (not unsolved, but unprosecuted) murders of Henry Dee, Charles Moore, and Wharlest Jackson Sr., for starters. So when I see your case and Emmett Till on the same page, I have a hard time relating the two. They are different in scale. The Emmett Till case is horribly unjust, and one of the things that makes it horribly unjust is that death silenced the poor kid right away, that the corpse whose photo you put on that page is the corpse of a 15-year-old boy who was never older. So while I can imagine that your situation is very frustrating in some ways, I find it hard to comprehend how you can see it as tantamount to the Till murder. I'm running an 101-degree fever right now, so I'm both mildly delirious and seriously cranky, but when I look at your blog entry I feel like you're not treating those photos of Mr. Till with the somber gravity and dignitiy that they, particularly the postmortem photo, deserve. I am not offended by the fact that you posted the photos; on the contrary, the JFP recently printed the postmortem photo at full page size, and I think that everyone in this country, especially every white, needs to take a hard look at those photos and meditate on what they mean. But I do find myself offended at the way you use them. There is clearly a story in the shabby way you were treated by both public and private sector folks in New Hampshire, and I hope you find justice. But I'm personally turned off by the way you present your case, and I can't help but think that others might be as well. Cheers, TH

Author

Tom Head

Date

2005-12-28T02:15:23-06:00

ID

103600

Comment

...and if Tom finds it disturbing, you have serious problems. :)

Author

Ironghost

Date

2005-12-28T08:12:30-06:00

ID

103601

Comment

I always appreciate the feedback; I get heaps of praise and less than that at times. I would categorize your response as less than that. What I find disgusting is that someone like Clarence Thomas can lay claim to lynching when I can't. Anyway, the issue goes beyond the NH NAACP because National has agreed with them. So if you read my blawg carefully you can see where NAACP referral attorney in Cleveland ripped my father off, then see where Boston NAACP did nothing to help a bunch of us at American Tower, then see where they are screwing me in NH. Also, the Columbus, Ohio NAACP layed down and died on numerous occasions involving racism and the KKK: http://christopher-king.blogspot.com/2005/12/truth-about-king-in-columbus.html I used to say "NH NAACP" in my posts but no more. The fish rots at the head. http://christopher-king.blogspot.com/2005/12/what-naacp-failed-to-do.html http://christopher-king.blogspot.com/2005/12/more-naacp-idiocy.html They can't lynch us anymore, so they just try to put us in Prison so we can get violated and silenced. I respectfully dissent and ask this Court for reconsideration. And if not, well at a minimum we have living proof of the value of the First Amendment -- that the NAACP didn't give hoot about in Columbus or in New Hampshire. No Justice, No Peace.

Author

Christopher King

Date

2005-12-28T09:51:50-06:00

ID

103602

Comment

PS: Susan Klopfer may or may not agree with you or me, but she certainly finds the matter of substantial interest. http://emmett-till.blogspot.com/2005/12/web-mail-message.html -c

Author

Christopher King

Date

2005-12-28T09:54:21-06:00

ID

103603

Comment

Mr. King, I don't think Clarence Thomas had any legitimate claim to lynching, but I never expected him to know any better. He was, and probably still is, a Republican stooge. Very little self-respect. He didn't even want to head up the EEOC; he wanted to do tax law. But he let himself be pushed into civil rights law because conservatives wanted a token black guy representing their views (anti-affirmative action, et. al.) in that field. His "high-tech lynching" comment was so ridiculously stupid that it became iconic. I want to be clear that I don't disagree with what you're doing, by the way. I'm mostly uninformed about it, but what I see tells me that you were shafted in this situation, and certainly the suspension of Chief Dunn on 12/16 adds credibility to your case. What I disagree with is the way you present what you're doing--condemning the entire NAACP when the vast majority of members and officers have nothing to do with the situation, and using the postmortem photo of Emmett Till to illustrate your point. And the reason I disagree with the way you present it is precisely because I suspect you're probably in the right, and learned that only after researching the Union-Leader archives. Your case is already dramatic enough. In my opinion as an outside reader (which may or may not mean anything), your cause is not helped by angry condemnations of the country's leading civil rights organization, or references to slavery and lynching, or a random non sequitur photograph of a murdered 15-year-old child's badly decomposed face. But maybe that's just me. Cheers, TH

Author

Tom Head

Date

2005-12-28T15:49:28-06:00

ID

103604

Comment

Dear Mr. Head: Thanks for the heads-up on Chief Dunn. Now I know at least in part why he was so pissy last time I saw him! As to the Emmett Till reference, I think you and I may respectfully disagree, and many others may agree with your or with me -- but the point is, it puts the issue into public discourse. PS: You are probably aware that Clarence Thomas actually benefitted from Affirmative Action, right? My blawg posts certainly run the gamut -- the ladder of abstraction -- and there are more links than you can shake a stick at, but one thing that is consistent is that I have waited for various NAACP "leaders" to act responsibly throughout my careers, as I pointed out above, and I gave credit to responsible NAACP leaders, one of whom told me to start audioblawgging -- thereby changing the, ummm..... complexion of this case markedly. You have a great blog, my Brother. Glad to meet you and even if we disagree on some aspects, it's All Good. I hope to meet you one day. From this side of a prison cell, of course.

Author

Christopher King

Date

2005-12-28T17:17:35-06:00

ID

103605

Comment

You're on! You might have already seen it, but here's the article on Dunn's suspension. Best of luck to you. Here's hoping the case ends as it should; and I'll be watching your blog for the latest. Cheers, TH

Author

Tom Head

Date

2005-12-28T19:30:52-06:00

ID

103606

Comment

Thanks, brother -- here's a slightly older blawg piece where I narrowed the blame: http://christopher-king.blogspot.com/2005/11/why-nashua-naacp-still-sucks-why-all.html -c

Author

Christopher King

Date

2005-12-28T20:10:36-06:00