The Mystery of Harriet Miers

Posted on October 10, 2005

Time magazine leads with a piece on Harriet Miers about the two knocks against her and how she's going to be confirmed anyway. There's not a lot that is new in the article except for the tidbit that she was once engaged. But the article doesn't give any thrilling details, such as the fiance's name. Other than that, it just rehashes what we already know: not much. The article speculates that when Rove was out of the office with kidney stones, Andy Card (who doesn't get along with Rove at all) cooked up the Harriet Miers nomination with President Bush, keeping it a secret from everyone -- including Harriet.

One of Miers' jobs as White House counsel was to judge the judges, including the search that ended with the Roberts pick. According to a presidential adviser who has been briefed on the chronology of the decision, senior adviser Karl Rove was less involved than he is in most major decisions. Some conservatives speculate that Rove was distracted or out of the loop because of his possible legal jeopardy in the CIA leak case, but White House officials reject that notion. The driving force was chief of staff Andrew H. Card Jr., who took over the vetting role. "This is something that Andy and the President cooked up," the adviser told TIME. "Andy knew it would appeal to the President because he loves appointing his own people and being supersecret and stealthy about it." Relations between Rove and Card have always been strained, and this adviser said the nomination has reignited the tension. Another Republican involved said it reflected Bush's isolation. "Somebody just like her should have told him, "Mr. President, no. This is a mistake." But he picked the picker, so there was no one there to tell him no."

And as for whether she'll be a Sandra Day O'Connor or a Clarence Thomas, an SMU classmate Gary Rice says he thinks she'll more of an O'Connor-type justice.

"My theory is that she is going to be a Justice very much like Sandra Day O'Connor," says Gary Rice, in words that might cheer moderates but spook anyone looking for someone with a weed whacker who will go after liberal rulings of the past 30 years. "If she moves the law, it will be in small steps. She won't be one to say, 'Let's just throw all that out and do something different.'" One of the most intriguing insights into the Real Harriet Miers came from her longtime friend, former law partner and sometime love interest Justice Nathan Hecht, who is considered the most conservative justice on the Texas Supreme Court. "This is very important, and I don't think the public understands," he told TIME. "When you take an oath and swear that you will judge cases properly after that, you can't inject your personal views or religious faith into decisions because it would be wrong. You would either be a bad Christian or a bad judge. Religion says a lot about who you are personally, but it says nothing about stare decisis [following precedent], the commerce clause, the First Amendment, search and seizure or any of the issues she's going to deal with." All of which will surely leave some Christian activists wondering, What's the good of having the first Evangelical on the bench if she leaves her faith in the robing room?

One thing's for sure: this will be much more contentious confirmation hearing than Justice Roberts had.