Editorial Boards Opposing Pickering Nomination

said, "Judge Charles Pickering just might be a nice guy...But the question the Senate Judiciary Committee has to ask itself about Pickering's appointment to the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals is whether his judicial philosophy, public record and view of the Constitution are consistent with the basic American commitment to civil rights, fairness and equality. In these areas, he fails. "

On March 5th, The Houston Chronicle

said, "A few judicial nominees deserve to be Borked, and Charles W. Pickering Sr. is one. If Pickering were just a throwback to the worst days of Jim Crow, it would be one thing, but as recently as 1994, he argued that prosecutors should go easy on a man convicted of burning a cross on the lawn of an interracial couple and shooting into their house.

On February 27th, The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

said, "But Wisconsin's two senators - Herb Kohl and Russ Feingold, both of whom serve on the Judiciary Committee - should take note of Pickering's overall hostility to the effort to make real the American dream of equality. That hostility should disqualify him from filling an appellate court vacancy.

On February 27th,The Los Angeles Times

said, "In two days of testimony earlier this month, Judge Charles Pickering made clearer than ever why the Senate Judiciary Committee should block his elevation to the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals. One question remains. After poring over Pickering's record and grilling him during the hearing, will the senators who pronounced themselves "troubled" match their rhetoric with the "no" votes this nomination deserves?"

On February 26th, The Boston Globe

said, "The nomination is in serious trouble. But not because Pickering is a conservative political and social issue activist. It's in trouble because a voluminous paper trail shows that Pickering took his political activism into the judiciary in a manner that is incompatible with his current job and dangerous in a potential appellate judge a rung below the Supreme Court.

On February 24th, The New York Times

said, "If President bush is committed to speeding up confirmations, he should name men and woman who have distinguished records and do not have the hard-right views and ethical problems that Mr. Pickering does."

On February 16th., The San Francisco Chronicle

said, "The nomination of Charles W. Pickering for the U.S. Court of Appeals in New Orleans does not bode well for the direction of the federal judiciary under President Bush."

On February 12th, The Register-Guard (Eugene, Oregon)

said, "Charles Pickering's background suggests a mixed view on race, a strong opposition to women's right to choose an abortion, a possible fib about his connection to the Mississippi Sovereignty Commission and a relaxed view of judicial ethics. None of that adds up to a good reason to put him on the appeals court that covers Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas. If anything, it adds up to a reason to reject his nomination. The Senate should do just that."

On February 9th, The Boston Globe

said, "Trace Pickering's legal roots to 1959 and one finds an article he wrote as a law student advising the Mississippi Legislature how to close a loophole so the state could better punish people in interracial marriages. Sadly, even if this article is dismissed as old or just an academic exercise, there are still decades of legal thinking that make Pickering the wrong choice for circuit court judge."

On February 7th, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

said, "In offering Pickering for the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, the president is making a mockery of the bipartisan cooperation that he has touted since Sept. 11. Pickering has such a shameful record on civil rights that even moderate Republicans are having second thoughts about his nomination."

On February 6th,

The Los Angeles Times

said, "Pickering's decisions in voting rights, discrimination and prisoner rights cases display indifference if not hostility to those asking the courts to remedy injustice" the American people have the right to expect their judges, especially those on the powerful appeals court, to listen to each case with an open mind and judge it on the law and its merits. Pickering can't do that."

On January 26th, The Detroit Free Press

said, "Pickering is an unreconstructed Dixiecrat whose writings, votes, and record over the course of a long legal and political career evince a disturbing degree of bias against civil rights, women's rights, civil liberties and black Americans in general."

On February 7th, Bob Herbert wrote in The New York Times,

"But when Mr. Pickering was selected by President George Bush the First to fill a District Court seat in 1990 he not only denied any contact with the commission, he said that when he was a state senator it "had, in effect, been abolished for a number of years." That certainly wasn't true."