Are Senate Democrats Determined to Keep Believers off the Bench?

A study of the earliest federal judicial nominees reveals that they were expected to be of the highest character, display sober temperament, experience no incidents of moral turpitude, and profess a belief in God and the Bible. A federal judge’s public display of faith was considered to be a mark of the highest ethical standards and an indication of fairness and concern for all who would seek justice in the courts.

Times have changed.

Today the Senate Judiciary Committee has become a modern-day lion’s den, with people of faith being savaged for embracing their beliefs. To judge by the growing opposition in the Senate to President Bush’s judicial nominees, it is apparent that those who actively adhere to religious doctrine are to be viewed with suspicion and blocked from the bench.

Alabama Attorney General William Pryor, the most recent Daniel to face the hungry lions, has made the "mistake" of not distancing himself from his faith. In a recent confirmation hearing for Mr. Pryor, a nominee to the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Sen. Charles Schumer (D., N.Y.) said plainly that Mr. Pryor’s deeply held personal convictions as a pro-life Catholic simply would not be left at the courthouse door. In other words, being a Catholic is just fine if you are Sen. Leahy or Sen. Kennedy and selectively follow the doctrines of the faith. But if you actually practice Catholic teaching, you need not apply for a federal judgeship.

Senate Democrats, however, are not the only ones to "express concern" over judicial nominees who have written or spoken out on their faith. According to my sources in the Senate, Republican female senators have voiced strong reservations over the nomination of Leon Holmes, President Bush’s federal judicial nominee to the eastern district of Arkansas.

Although Mr. Holmes has the support of his two home state Democratic senators, and a stellar legal career with high marks from the American Bar Association, qualifications do not seem to matter to the Republican women. Instead they have swallowed Sen. Schumer’s bait--that litmus tests on religious belief should determine whether one is qualified on the federal bench.

The heartburn in the Senate sorority over Mr. Holmes seems to stem from the fact that, as a practicing Catholic, he has written that he and his wife subscribe to the Old and New Testament teaching on marriage. In short, he believes that a husband and wife in a Christian marriage have unique roles in the family, both equally important, but with the husband serving as its spiritual head. Mr. Holmes apparently subscribes to the book of Ephesians by loving his wife "as Christ does the Church." Shocking! From this belief Republican women in the Senate have reportedly concluded that Mr. Holmes is tiptoeing down Misogynist Lane, even though he stated his views in an article co-authored with his well-educated and accomplished wife.

As Mrs. Holmes wrote to women senators: "I am incredulous that some apparently believe my husband views men and women as unequal, when the article states explicitly that men and women are equal. . . . I assure you that I have never considered myself subservient to anyone."

It cannot be mere coincidence that Mr. Holmes--as well as fellow disputed nominees like Mr. Pryor, Carolyn Kuhl (in the Ninth Circuit), Bob Conrad (eastern district of North Carolina) and three of the four stalled nominees from Michigan (Sixth Circuit)--is a practicing Catholic. For Catholics, Purgatory may very well be the judicial nominations process. Then again, Charles Pickering, a nominee for the Sixth Circuit who once served as president of the Mississippi Southern Baptist Convention, and Priscilla Owen, a filibustered Fifth Circuit nominee and Episcopalian Sunday school teacher, are also under attack.

What seems to have escaped the skittish senators is that, regardless of what these nominees believe personally, as constitutionalists and strict constructionists they recognize that their role as federal judges is to apply the Constitution and the law as they find it--no matter how contrary it may be to their personal belief system. It is judicial activism, whether on the left or the right, that is cause for concern, and the nominees under suspicion are opposed to it.

This should matter but doesn’t seem to. Maybe the Senate should just print a sign that reads: "Believers Need Not Apply."

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