Confirmation Begins: Judge Sotomayor's confirmation hearings are underway, and SCOTUSblog provided a "LiveBlog" of today's proceedings. As SCOTUSblog reported yesterday, today's session was occupied primarily by the opening statements of members of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Long time Supreme Court reporter Tony Mauro's thoughts on today's hearings are available on Blog of Legal Times. Sometime this afternoon, Judge Sotomayor made her opening statement to the Committee. In her opening statement, Judge Sotomayor summed up her judicial philosophy in four words: "fidelity to the law." She believes that her record "reflects [her] rigorous commitment to interpreting the Constitution
according to its terms; interpreting statutes according to their terms
and Congress's intent; and hewing faithfully to precedents established
by the Supreme Court and my Circuit Court." The Ninth Justice has provided a copy of her statement here. Also blogging on The Ninth Justice today, Stuart Taylor Jr. comments that Judge Sotomayor should not "disclose her views on issues that might come before her, except at a high level of generality[,]" as she is questioned by Senators. He reminds us that Robert Bork was not confirmed after he "detail[ed] his views on just about every hot issue." He also argues that a judge can refuse to say what she thinks about the issues because "answering such questions threatens judicial integrity and independence, as distinguished from impartiality." He believes that when Senators question a Supreme Court candidate "[t]hey are pressing for implicit commitments akin to campaign promises." These promises could later conflict with any views the nominee privately expressed to the White House, and could cause the Justice to act impartially. This strange reality has led Taylor to conclude that it is better to evaluate nominees' views based on their pre-nomination records than to corrupt the selection and confirmation process.
Gender Plays a Role in Death Penalty Administration: Over the weekend Doug Berman posted a link to this article, and asked should a federal judge "feel a special obligation to impose a sentence of death if he believes that the jury recommended a life sentence only or primarily because the defendant here was a woman?" Berman's question was prompted by TimesDaily reporter Dennis Sherer's account of the conviction and sentencing of Christie Michelle Scott in Russellville, Alabama. According to Sherer, Scott killed her 6-year-old son so she could collect on three life insurance policies that totaled $175,000. A jury convicted her of three counts capital murder and recommended that that she be sentenced to life in prison without parole. The district judge is not required to accept the jury's recommendation and could instead sentence her to death. If this happens, Scott will be one of ten women sentenced to death in Alabama since 1973. If she receives the sentence she will join the four women, and 199 men sitting on Alabama's death row. Of course, gender is not the only reason so many more men receive the death penalty. Bryan K. Fair, a professor of law at the University of Alabama, commented "The kinds of offenses that can be punished by death are typically committed by men. In our society in general, violent crimes are committed most often by men."
Is It Legal for the CIA to Kill Bin Laden?: This is the question posed by Siobhan Gorman that tells us the the CIA didn't mention to Congress a secret initiative that was an attempt to carry out a 2001 presidential authorization to capture or kill al Qaeda operatives. Searcey believes this "skirts the legal elephant in the room in the most recent revelation: if our CIA's shaggy assassins (trust us, we've seen those secret agent types on the Iraqi battlefield and they appear to never, ever shave) came across Osama bin Laden in a cave, can they legally kill him on the spot?" According to this report, from the Congressional Research Service of the Library of Congress, resident Ronald Reagan issued an executive order in 1981 prohibiting assassination, directly or indirectly - and specifically singled out the "Intelligence Community." This could be in direct conflict with the joint resolutions authorizing the President to "use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons, in order to prevent any future acts of international terrorism against the United States by such nations, organizations or persons."
Gender Plays a Role in Death Penalty Administration: Over the weekend Doug Berman posted a link to this article, and asked should a federal judge "feel a special obligation to impose a sentence of death if he believes that the jury recommended a life sentence only or primarily because the defendant here was a woman?" Berman's question was prompted by TimesDaily reporter Dennis Sherer's account of the conviction and sentencing of Christie Michelle Scott in Russellville, Alabama. According to Sherer, Scott killed her 6-year-old son so she could collect on three life insurance policies that totaled $175,000. A jury convicted her of three counts capital murder and recommended that that she be sentenced to life in prison without parole. The district judge is not required to accept the jury's recommendation and could instead sentence her to death. If this happens, Scott will be one of ten women sentenced to death in Alabama since 1973. If she receives the sentence she will join the four women, and 199 men sitting on Alabama's death row. Of course, gender is not the only reason so many more men receive the death penalty. Bryan K. Fair, a professor of law at the University of Alabama, commented "The kinds of offenses that can be punished by death are typically committed by men. In our society in general, violent crimes are committed most often by men."
Is It Legal for the CIA to Kill Bin Laden?: This is the question posed by Siobhan Gorman that tells us the the CIA didn't mention to Congress a secret initiative that was an attempt to carry out a 2001 presidential authorization to capture or kill al Qaeda operatives. Searcey believes this "skirts the legal elephant in the room in the most recent revelation: if our CIA's shaggy assassins (trust us, we've seen those secret agent types on the Iraqi battlefield and they appear to never, ever shave) came across Osama bin Laden in a cave, can they legally kill him on the spot?" According to this report, from the Congressional Research Service of the Library of Congress, resident Ronald Reagan issued an executive order in 1981 prohibiting assassination, directly or indirectly - and specifically singled out the "Intelligence Community." This could be in direct conflict with the joint resolutions authorizing the President to "use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons, in order to prevent any future acts of international terrorism against the United States by such nations, organizations or persons."
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