Word: ashcroft
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Whatever one thinks of the legal reasoning employed in White's dissent, it was clearly the precedent-based conclusion of a reasonable jurist, not the ravings of a black-robed subversive intent on rewriting the law. As part of his political move, however, Ashcroft said the reasoning was based on "an outrageous technicality" and accused White of harbouring a "personal political agenda...
...evidence for his assertions, Ashcroft cited the case of Missouri v. Johnson, where White wrote one of his few unaccompanied dissents. James Johnson had killed several law-enforcement officers, and the defense argued that he had been suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder due to his experience in Vietnam. In opening arguments, they cited a rope perimeter that Johnson had set up to guard the house from enemies, since "that's what you do in Vietnam, you renourish and rest while your buddies stand guard duty...
...political outcry was immediate, and Ashcroft, eager to capitalize on the decision, later invited the family of Mease's victims to attend hearings. Since the Pope's visit, Carnahan has been doing all he can to look tough--as one aide told the Washington Post, "Mel's been stacking up bodies right and left"--but the death penalty is still a sore spot in his campaign. So when Ashcroft described Judge White as "pro-criminal and activist" on the Senate floor, he was making a perfect political maneuver. Yet as Ashcroft surely knew, the description didn't quite match...
...nomination is dead now, politics having excluded a worthy candidate from the bench, but it still causes tempers to flare in Missouri. Because many minority nominees are still held up in committee, Ashcroft and the Senate have been accused of racism. A rally was held in St. Louis to protest White's rejection only a week ago, and Judge White is occasionally referred to by supporters as "Judge Not White Enough...
However, the spurious charge of racism obscures a greater threat. Ashcroft began his campaign against White by arguing that he had voted to overturn a death penalty 14 times. Later, the tactics became more sophisticated, and White's votes were compared to others on the court (some of whom, Ashcroft appointees, had voted against more death penalties than he), but the count-the-numbers approach betrays a cynical assumption that any vote to reverse the death penalty is suspect, that the courts should rubber-stamp death sentences instead of conducting meaningful review...