Word: bork
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...Bork was composing his withdrawal speech that afternoon, Simpson called. "I've been thinking it over," the Senator said. "You ought to stand up for the principle involved if you think you can do it." Bork's resolve began to weaken. Meanwhile, his family debated the decision in a law clerks' lounge across the hall. Soon after he finished talking to Simpson, they entered his chambers. "Something's bothering us," Charles Bork told his father. "You can't quit. To quit now would be to a great degree to concede the validity of the attack against...
...Bork decided they were right. He likened the situation to his role in the Saturday Night Massacre, when his first inclination was to resign after firing Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox at President Nixon's request. Instead, he decided it would be best to stay and see the crisis through. Putting aside his withdrawal statement, Bork began, with the help of his sons, to draft an eloquent explanation of his decision to fight...
...appearance in the White House briefing room the next day was as dramatic as any since Meese and Reagan announced the Iran-contra arms-profit diversion. "Were the fate of Robert Bork the only thing at stake," said the judge, his voice breaking with emotion, "I would ask the President to withdraw my nomination." But, lashing out at the aggressive drive to squash his confirmation, Bork said the appointment of judges must not be decided by "campaigns of distortion." The judge declared his nomination should be given a "full debate and final Senate decision...
...Bork's statement was a stunning, defiant gesture, particularly since it occurred at the end of a week in which his chances for confirmation dissipated with dizzying speed. First the Senate Judiciary Committee voted 9 to 5 to send the nomination to the floor with a negative recommendation. All three of the panel members who were undecided when the hearings began -- Republican Arlen Specter and Democrats Dennis DeConcini and Howell Heflin -- voted against Bork. The parade of lawmakers announcing their intention to oppose Bork in the full Senate vote accelerated. By Friday, 53 Senators had come out against...
...onslaught prompted a flurry of recriminations over "who lost Bork." Hard-line conservatives criticized Reagan and his aides for not anticipating the strength of the Bork opposition. They also attacked the White House's leisurely execution of its lobbying campaign for the judge. Daniel Casey, executive director of the American Conservative Union, complained that he had urged the President to swing through the South to lobby for Bork during the dog days of summer. "Instead," griped Casey, "he was sent off to Santa Barbara for 30 days to chop wood and ride horses." Iowa's Republican Senator Charles Grassley...