NAACP Questions Roberts Nomination
August 15, 2005
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The Senate Judiciary Committee is scheduled to begin confirmation hearings on Judge John Roberts' nomination to the US Supreme Court on Tuesday, September 6, 2005. However, as part of our ongoing investigation into his nomination, the NAACP has found several newly revealed and disturbing instances in which Judge Roberts' legal philosophy and judicial temperament appear to be detrimental to the civil rights, civil liberties and educational equity issues supported by the NAACP, including race and gender discrimination and affirmative action.
Thus the NAACP is urging in the strongest possible terms that Senators ask hard and thorough questions relating to Judge Roberts' position on a variety of crucial issues, and that Judge Roberts answer them fully, candidly and to our satisfaction. Unless we get complete and satisfactory answers to all of our concerns, we will oppose his nomination and call on the Senate to do the same.
Specifically, the NAACP concerns about past positions John Roberts promoted include:
- School desegregation: As Assistant White House Counsel, Roberts argued with Assistant Attorney General Ted Olson about whether Congress could enact a law prohibiting federal courts from using busing to remedy school segregation. Roberts concluded that it was within Congress's authority to prohibit federal courts from ordering busing.
- Race discrimination in employment:As Special Assistant in the Justice Department, Roberts lectured the staunchly conservative Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights, William Bradford Reynolds, for dangerous and much too broad interpretations of fair employment laws regarding proof of discrimination and remedies for discrimination.
- Affirmative action: In a memo to the US Department of Labor, Mr. Roberts, then with the US Department of Justice, argued "Under our view of the law it is not enough to say that blacks and women have been historically discriminated against as groups and are therefore entitled to special preferences." He went on to erroneously state, "Affirmative Action programs require the recruiting of inadequately prepared candidates".
- Voting Rights: As Special Assistant, Roberts was a principal architect of the opposition to an "effects" test under the Voting Rights Act. However, the House of Representatives had voted for the effects test, by an overwhelming margin of 389 to 24, even before Roberts embarked on this campaign. The Senate, by 85-8, then approved a compromise bill essentially preserving the NAACP supported "effects test". Even South Carolina Sen. Strom Thurmond supported the bill.
The NAACP is making it clear to all member of the United States Senate that we must receive satisfactory answers to these questions, and our concerns must be resolved, or we will urge the Senate to oppose Roberts.
Thank you for your attention to this important matter!!!
For more information on the Roberts nomination, call Hilary Shelton at the NAACP Washington Bureau at (202) 463-2940, call your local NAACP branch or visit http://www.naacp.org/.
Trina D. Robinson, PresidentNAACP South Bend
914 Lincolnway West
South Bend, IN 46601
(574) 289-2123
St. Joe Valley Greens, South Bend, IN