Here’s someone we’d like to see appointed to the Supreme Court — Ann Claire Williams.
She was first appointed to the bench by President Reagan, then elevated by President Clinton. She’s tough on crime, and if anyone from Chicago is going to be appointed to the Supreme Court, she’s certainly worthy of that seat on the bench herself.
Lawyers we know in Chicago have always spoken highly of Williams.
It will be interesting to see what the current president decides to do, and if he will make Bush’s mistake with Harriet Meyers and attempt to place a personal friend of his on the bench, like Deval Patrick, or if he will try to put someone with University of Chicago connections on the Supreme Court, like Diane Wood, Cass Sunstein, or Elena Kagan.
We feel about Williams the way we felt about Kirsten Gillibrand for the NY Senate seat vacated by Hillary Clinton — right now, she’s someone being mentioned in a top ten list of possible appointees, but she’s not at the top, just like Gillibrand wasn’t. But, the “top” candidates being talked about are people we just don’t see making it onto the court anymore than we thought Harriet Meyers would become a Justice.
But, we can picture Ann Claire Williams taking Souter’s place, and more or less voting exactly the same way Souter did for many years to come. She’s a pick Republicans won’t have much to complain about, especially considering Reagan appointed her to the bench to begin with, and a pick moderate Democrats will also love. The only people who won’t be jumping up and down for her are the radicals on the Left, of which Williams has never seemed to pay much attention to, and we doubt that would start now.
Justice Williams would be a very good pick. There are other people who’d be good on the Court, of course, but for the moment this is who we think is the candidate to keep an eye on and learn more about.
May 3, 2009 at 2:28 pm
Ann Williams is a pick I think I’d be happy with. I have limited knowledge of her judicial history, but what I’ve found so far makes me believe she cows to no one. She refuses to identify herself as a Republican or Democrat, and is quoted as saying “I am not in Congress. We don’t legislate in the courts.”
She has a lot going for her. She’s a woman, she’s African American, and she’s from Chicago. She’s not appearing on any conservative watch lists for radical judges, at least not so far. And as you said, she was nominated by Reagan and elevated by Clinton, and unanimously affirmed by the Senate.
Obama might just have her near the top of his short list. One can only hope.
I’m trying hard to pin down Obama’s strategy here. On the one hand, I feel from his comments that he WANTS an activist judge. On the other hand, I think he knows that if he picks someone too far left he will be blasted by the Republicans and it’s probably not going to change the voting anyway, therefore he has little to gain. Even if Ginsberg steps down within the next four years – which seems likely – Obama still doesn’t have a huge opportunity to change the voting of the court with super radical appointments.
I think he’s leaving the doors open to appoint someone radical if he so chooses, but maybe it’s just a smoke screen. Maybe he’s hoping conservatives will rally against a bunch of people and work themselves into a fervor over it, just so he can pick someone very fair minded and make himself look really good.
Then again, who knows? I could not have possibly predicted how far left Obama has gone on so many issues, so maybe I should give up trying! =)
May 3, 2009 at 5:36 pm
I honestly don’t think he cares what the Republicans think. He “won”, remember? While I think it would go a long way for him to pick someone like this, who could win favor with both sides, I have to think he’s going to pick someone really radical. He’s probably looking at a tax cheat (because his picks always are) who hates the Constitution and wants to take away our civil liberties.
That’s just what I’ve come to expect in the first 100 days, anyway. If he’s ever going to try to own up to his campaign promises of bringing both sides together, it will probably not be until it gets closer to 2012.
May 3, 2009 at 3:46 pm
I think he’s going to pick a Jihadist.Someone who is sympathetic to the life of Mohammad and can assist America into a backward march into the stone age.
May 3, 2009 at 7:43 pm
Haaaaa haaaa ahaaa a ahhahhahhha.
That cracks me up.
Oops.
You may be right bro!
May 3, 2009 at 8:53 pm
A lot of good comments here. This one is incredibly stupid and offensive.
May 3, 2009 at 10:32 pm
Offensive is just the way we like it.
May 3, 2009 at 10:57 pm
That’s obvious.
May 3, 2009 at 4:00 pm
We need someone who understands the constitution (esp also who understands what defines a Natural Born Citizen) and my #1 candidate is:
…out lesbian Kathleen Sullivan, a professor at the Stanford Law School who served as dean of the school from 1999 to 2004, founded and currently acts as director of the Stanford Constitutional Law Center.
She has also been involved in some of the most historically prominent LGBT-related court cases, including Bowers v. Hardwick and Lawrence v. Texas. Sullivan, the first female dean of any school at Stanford, has been a strong proponent of privacy issues, including abortion and gay rights. She studied at Cornell University, Oxford, where she was a Marshall Scholar, and earned her J.D. at Harvard Law School in 1981.
http://guerillawomentn.blogspot.com/
May 3, 2009 at 4:08 pm
I don’t think there is anyone in the Senate or Congress who will deny him his choice. Plus, he might slip it through on one of his Friday Night stealth runs. Given the selections he has made so far, my guess is it will be an in your face choice…a spokesperson for CAIR, or a member of the Hispanic Caucus who is pushing for amnesty for illegal aliens….people he might see as solidifying his base….or worse yet, a member of the ACLU. Unless of course, Soros has already told him who he wants. Having seen Soros pressing for this administration to prosecute the previous president and the previous administration, and seeing Obama heading in that direction, I don’t think there is anything Obama can refuse Soros, and a “Supreme” would just be the icing on Soros’s cake.
May 3, 2009 at 4:53 pm
Oh I think the Republicans are all over this one. The Senate as a whole might not be STOPPING him, but I wouldn’t be surprised to see Republicans put up a fight, assuming the pick is somewhat radical.
May 3, 2009 at 6:57 pm
I hope you are right…their job is to interpert the Constitution, not be “sensitive” as he suggested.
May 3, 2009 at 7:09 pm
And while they don’t have any stopping power on the floor, Specter actually handed the Republicans a huge favor by changing parties. In order for any nominee to get out of the Judiciary Committee, the Dem’s need one minority vote. Specter can’t help ‘em now. LOL.
May 3, 2009 at 10:35 pm
yes, that is why lady justice wheres a blind fold. Liberal leftists don’t care about the constitution.
May 3, 2009 at 5:50 pm
As a conservative democrat, now a newly registered independent, I would agree with you HillBuzz, this lady is more of a conservative with empathy than a liberal. She is a judge, but not really an activist judge, which is what I want in a judge, any judge.
I would hope that the america-apologist fraud picks someone like her.
I doubt it, the man is a radical, I am convinced of it.
If he picks this lady, then I might have to reevaluate my opinion of him, but somehow I don’t see the america-loathing messaih picking this qualified lady.
May 3, 2009 at 7:47 pm
Tim:
The radical Alinsky/Obama will pick someone who will remake the constitution, with hearts and flowers and pixie dust for those who are “downtrodden”.
I am a middle of the road conservative.
I just want a judge to follow the damn law.
So you and I have something in common.
May 3, 2009 at 8:50 pm
Tammy says:
“I just want a judge to follow the damn law.”
Talk about a radical concept!!!!!
May 3, 2009 at 9:03 pm
The eminent domain case from a few years ago sums up what I do not want in a judge.
I do not want judges that believe government should have the power to take whatever it wants for whatever reason. Unfortunately, that seems to be Obama’s philosophy so I assume he will pick a like-minded judge.
May 3, 2009 at 10:06 pm
Amen, FlMom. All I want is for judges to stop spitting on the constitution. I reminds me of a Tea Party sign. LEGALIZE THE CONSTITUTION.
I don’t think that is too much to ask.
May 3, 2009 at 10:08 pm
“It” :)
May 3, 2009 at 11:14 pm
NY Times profile on Hillary from Friday y’all may be interested in
“Her Rival Now Her Boss, Clinton Settles Into New Role.”
here are interesting excerpts…
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By all accounts, Mrs. Clinton has worked hard to be a good soldier in an administration run by the man she spent much of last year trying to defeat. She and President Obama have developed a respectful rapport, several officials said, and she has emerged as an influential voice in the great policy debates of the day, notably Afghanistan and Pakistan.
“I love the job; I mean, it’s really hard,” Mrs. Clinton said in a recent interview. “We’ve inherited so many problems.”
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As a candidate, Mrs. Clinton was criticized for poor management of her campaign. She appears determined not to repeat her mistakes. Mrs. Clinton said she had sought fresh voices; mindful that previous secretaries of state have been criticized for cloistering themselves on the building’s seventh floor, she has made a point of dropping in at its bureaus.
But Mrs. Clinton has turned a corner in recent weeks, these people say, both as a manager and as a diplomat. Her stern public warnings about the recent Taliban offensive in Pakistan put her on center stage as the messenger of American unease.
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These days, Mrs. Clinton has a regular Thursday afternoon meeting with the current president. People who have been in meetings with them say their relationship is comfortable, if not warm.
On a recent afternoon, at Mrs. Clinton’s suggestion, the two moved their meeting outside to a picnic table on the South Lawn, next to a new swing set installed for Mr. Obama’s daughters. “We just had the best time,” she said.
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For Mrs. Clinton, the biggest challenge has been mental: absorbing a mountain of information on issues ranging from the Middle East to the race for fossil fuels in the Arctic Circle.
At 11 p.m. last Saturday, after 13 hours of meetings in Baghdad, Mrs. Clinton’s aides dozed on the military transport plane flying back to Kuwait. She sat alone at the front of the plane’s dimly lighted cargo bay, squinting as she plowed through a pile of briefing papers.
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Sounds like she’s enjoying her (exhausting) gig and doing a good job.
May 4, 2009 at 7:07 am
She is certainly showing all the haters how wrong they were. May her popularity ratings continue to fly high.