Sunday, July 10, 2005
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

Reid says moderate needed on court

WASHINGTON -- President Bush should resist the "radical right" and appoint a Supreme Court justice modeled after former Chief Justice Earl Warren, who led the court in broadening civil rights during the 1950s and 1960s, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada said Saturday.

Anticipating Bush may announce a successor this week for retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, Reid used the Democrats' weekly radio address to renew the Democratic Party's call for Bush to name a moderate replacement.

Noting that Saturday marked the anniversary of Warren's death in 1974, Reid said the former chief justice was able to form consensus on the court that led to its unanimous 1954 ruling in Brown v. Board of Education that outlawed segregation in schools.

"On one of the most difficult issues America has ever faced, Earl Warren was able to forge a consensus that today is our national consensus," Reid said.

"Mr. President, that's the kind of justice we hope you'll nominate, somebody who will bring us together, a mainstream justice who won't use their judicial robe as a cloak to impose their political ideology on the country."

The Warren Court became characterized as a "liberal court" that issued a stream of rulings widening civil rights and civil liberties.

The chief justice became a lightning rod for criticism among conservatives until he retired in 1969.

Reid said the "far right" is pressuring Bush to "pick not just a conservative, but an extreme conservative, someone out of the mainstream, someone who will impose their narrow partisan agenda from the perch of the highest court in the land. America deserves better."

Reid expressed hope that Bush and the Senate can work together to place a new justice "with enough common sense to know that Supreme Court justices should not impose a narrow partisan ideology but make rulings with an open mind and a big heart."