Speculation on future U.S. Supreme Court nominees begins
Last Thursday, Tom Goldstein at SCOTUSBlog posted The Democratic (Not So) Short List of potential U.S. Supreme Court nominees at for a Democratic administration in 2009. He gives extensive explanation of his methods, freely admitting he did not consider the potential candidate’s “intellect and judicial philosophy.” In that respect, I believe Goldstein emulated a number of presidents.
In his Follow-Up to the Democratic (Not So) Short List“the commonly held view that conservatives recognize the importance of judicial nominations much more than do liberals.”, Goldstein notes that the bulk of the commentary on his speculation was from the right, rather than left, confirming "the commonly held view that conservatives recognize the importance of judicial nominations much more than do liberals."
I agree that there seems to be an imbalance in the inclination to consider future court nominees in their voting, but I certainly lament that reality. If I took nothing else from law school (and some might say I seemed to pick up rather little), it was that there is no more influential position in this nation than that of an appellate judge. Unless, of course, it is the position held by the person who gets to choose those judges. Perhaps if more voters were aware of how the fabric of our society can change through the decisions of appellate courts, consideration of potential judicial choices would play a greater role in voter choice.
