Two major national newspapers editorialized on the Roberts nomination yesterday, and with all due respect, we think one got it right and the other simply doesn’t make sense.
The New York Times urged Senators to vote against the Roberts nomination because his pre-hearing record “raise[d] red flags on issues like civil rights, women’s rights and the right to privacy” and he therefore “needed to use the hearings to reassure the American people in a substantive way that he would be a vigilant guardian of their rights.” But instead, the Times accurately noted, “Over days of testimony, he dodged and weaved around many . . . .critical legal issues.” To exercise their Constitutional duty of “advice and consent” in a meaningful way, the Times concluded, Senators need information that has been withheld from them – and because they did not get it, Roberts has not proved he deserves the job and “the stakes are simply too high” for Senators to take the risk of giving it to him. Well said.
Now compare the Washington Post, which says that despite problematic aspects of his record such as his narrow view of civil rights protections, Roberts deserves support because: “Having done their duty by asking Judge Roberts tough questions, Democrats should not respond by withholding that support.” You read that right: because Senators asked tough questions, the Post reasons, they should vote in favor of the nomination regardless of the answers they got – if any! Never mind that Judge Roberts stonewalled them on key legal issues; as long as the questions were asked, that’s enough. (See here for samples of his stonewalling.) We wonder whether the Post stopped to consider that, according to its logic, there’s really no point in confirmation hearings at all – the Senate might as well let the nominee give an opening statement and leave it at that. We doubt that’s what “advice and consent” was really meant to look like.
