The Washington Post is all breathless today
because it found a Federalist Society document that lists Supreme Court
nominee John Roberts Jr. as a member. The story reads as if they had
uncovered his name on a Ku Klux Klan membership list from years back.
Duke Ph. D. (now an Emory law prof) David Garrow says Roberts’
membership isn’t the important thing, it’s merely his “intellectual
immersion” into the group’s views. The Post doesn’t even disguise that it took its cues on this story from the left:
Yesterday, a liberal organization that has been skeptical of
Roberts’s nomination said that the White House’s description of his
relationship with the society showed the need to take a close look at
his background.
“As this episode makes clear, the
Senate needs to go behind the glowing accounts of Roberts’s record to
figure out what he really thinks and what he really did,” said Nan
Aron, president of the Alliance for Justice, a liberal organization
that has been critical of the Roberts nomination.
So, what does the Post do? It obeys Aron’s every command.
Too bad they aren’t as aggressive in trying to nail down Sen. Robert
Byrd’s Klan activities of years past.
UPDATE: Juan on The Volokh Conspiracy blog points out that the script on grilling an appointee about Federalist Society membership is already well-worn.
