Way back in mid-July, shortly after John Roberts was nominated for the Supreme Court, there were a number of ideas of how best to use the process. If Dems weren’t going to defeat the nomination — with 55 Republican senators, a long-shot from the get-go — the trick of it was how to make the best of a bad situation.
Matthew Yglesias, among others, suggested highlighting issues important to the progressive cause with the confirmation process. As Ezra noted today, it seems at least some Senate Dems are on the same page.
Senate Democrats said yesterday that they will invoke the vast disparities in income and living conditions laid bare by the Hurricane Katrina disaster to sharpen their questioning of Supreme Court nominee John G. Roberts Jr. at his confirmation hearings next week.
The scenes of devastation featuring primarily poor African-American residents in New Orleans have highlighted the widening gap between rich and poor, said Senator Edward M. Kennedy, Democrat of Massachusetts.
With Roberts having urged a narrow interpretation of civil rights laws in the past, Senate Democrats will link the scenes of economic hardship with the constitutional and legal issues that surround efforts to address racial and economic inequalities, he said.
”We have made very important progress over the period of the last 50 years in knocking down walls of discrimination so that people can participate and be a part of a changed America,” said Kennedy, a senior member of the Senate Judiciary Committee. ”And he’s going to be asked to explain some of his advice that would have, I think, undermined that progress in important ways.”
It’s discouraging to read that Roberts may get as many as 25 Dem votes, but if Dems are successful in highlighting the connection between constitutional law, the conservative agenda, and racial and economic inequalities before a national audience, Roberts’ confirmation hearings may not be so useless after all.