I'll say up front that I'm not sure how to feel about the nomination of John Roberts for Chief Justice. It probably depends upon whom Bush nominates for the newly opened Associate Justice slot, which is what will really determine how far the SCOTUS shifts rightward from its precariously balanced Rehnquist/O'Connor position.
But as another diarist noted here, my strong impulse is to view this move as a striking defeat not just for Scalia and Thomas, but for the whole right-wing push to finish their drive to politicize the courts and the law itself. With a clear (though probably not easy) path to enshrining one of his "model Justices" as the agenda-setter and chief administrator of the high court, Bush instead has punted.
Progressives are concerned, and rightfully so, about Roberts' positions on issues and concepts like the right to privacy and reproductive freedoms. I agree with the sentiment that the higher-profile office to which he's now been nominated further strengthens the need for full disclosure of his positions. And while I still think he's going to get through, and that this won't be the worst thing in the world (see below), I'm even glad liberal groups are contesting the nomination.
But what I'd really like to see transpire in the hearings is for Roberts to be confronted with some of the probably intemperate (from our perspective) briefs and memos he wrote for the Reagan and Bush I administrations--and then for him to implicitly or explicitly reject those positions. And I have some faith that he will indeed do just that. The "it's just advocacy" excuse has some merit here, but so does the simple fact that people change, and often moderate, their views as age and experience enlightens them.
This is my hope for Roberts. Even those who oppose his nomination, here and elsewhere, agree that he's intellectually and experientially qualified to sit on the Court. And the Democrats who have opined on him--from Dorgan to Schumer--have generally been impressed with his "judicial temperament" and, by implication, his willingness to decide cases on the issues rather than according to personal ideology. To me, this is the most important consideration given the issues that the country is likely to face in a coming period of disruption or worse. Add in that as Chief Justice, he'll have no more incentive to vote in what could be considered his own political interests; this is as high as he's going to go.
The reason I view these considerations--the extent of Roberts' open-mindedness and aversion to ideological jurisprudence--as so important is that I believe we can't really anticipate what his, or the Court's, most important work will be in the years to come. But I do think it's pretty clear to people who view the world empirically that the cornerstones of the right-wing governing philosophy, from free-market fundamentalism to the opportunistic and "accordion-like" practice of federalism, to unfettered executive-branch supremacy, aren't working for the country. A justice of true "judicial temperament," as Earl Warren was, will recognize this--and will rule accordingly.