Salon.com has a
story about Attorney General Alberto Gonzales's service with Fifth Circuit Nominee Priscilla Owen:
More troubling for her nomination is that when he was Owen's colleague as a justice on the Texas Supreme Court, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales accused her of trying to implement "an unconscionable act of judicial activism." The charge came during a heated abortion ruling in which Owen tried to make the burden for a minor even more onerous than the Texas Legislature intended. Time and again while serving with Owen, Gonzales admonished her for straying too far from the clear intent of Texas statutes. Today, however, Gonzales praises Owen as "superbly qualified," while her supporters try valiantly -- and at times imaginatively -- to explain away the damning "judicial activism" description.
More below the fold.
The article elaborates about Gonzales's disgust with Owen:
As the liberal advocacy group People for the American Way has
documented, in the span of less than two years then-Justice Gonzales singled out Owen's dissents 11 times, accusing her of ignoring the legislative intent of laws and instead struggling to manufacture an outcome. "We're going to let Alberto Gonzales be our best witness," says Ralph Neas, president and CEO of the advocacy group.
In several decisions concerning Texas' Parental Notification Act, the Gonzales-led majority rejected the views of Owen and the other dissenters who regularly tried to make it harder for pregnant girls to obtain what's known in Texas as a "judicial bypass," meaning they didn't have to inform their parents before having an abortion. The majority scolded Owen, insisting that judges "cannot ignore the statute or the record," or try to create new law.
In a harmful-product case, Gonzales wrote that Owen's dissent (in favor of the manufacturer) would have required the court to act improperly and "judicially amend" the law.
In a wrongful-termination case, the Gonzales majority, which found in favor of a fired employee, criticized Owen's dissent, saying it "defies the Legislature's clear and express limits on our jurisdiction," adding, "We cannot simply ignore the legislative limits on our jurisdiction."
What does Gonzales say about her now? "Superbly qualified." Not according to the Houston Bar Association:
The American Bar Association rated Owen well qualified, but she received much lower marks from members of her local Houston Bar Association. According to its 2003 survey of Texas jurists, the most recent poll available from the association, just 43 percent labeled her work "outstanding," and 47 percent thought her performance on the bench was "poor." Hers was the highest "poor" rating of any of the justices on the all-Republican Texas Supreme Court. Interestingly, Owen received her lowest marks in response to the question asking whether she was "impartial and open-minded with respect to determining the legal issues."
There is a good reason why Judge Owen was rejected by the Judiciary Committee in the first place. But President Bush was stupid enough to make Owen the first person in the history of the Senate to be rejected by the Committee and renominated to the federal bench. Taking away the judicial filibuster will allow ideologues like Owen to impact law for decades.