On March 7, 2002 Sen. Orrin Hatch put a week-long hold on the Judiciary Committee's vote on Pickering's nomination. In doing so, Hatch resorted to name-calling and personal attacks against those who oppose Pickering, referring to the opposition as a form of "lynching." Pickering's nomination was rejected in March.

Pickering was renominated by President Bush on Jan. 7, 2003, just hours after Republicans took control of the Senate.

• Long known as an opponent of the Equal Rights Amendment.

• Chaired the Human Rights and Responsibilities Subcommittee of the Republican Party Platform Committee that approved a plank in the party platform protesting the Supreme Court's decision in Roe and calling for a constitutional amendment to ban abortion.

• While serving in the Mississippi Senate, Pickering voted for a resolution calling for a constitutional convention to propose an amendment to ban abortion. He voted against state funding for family planning.

• While Pickering was president of the Mississippi Baptist Convention, the organization adopted a resolution calling for legislation to ban abortion except to save the life of the mother.

• As a law student, Pickering wrote a law review article suggesting ways to amend the state's miscegenation statute to ensure it would be found constitutional. Nine years later, the Mississippi legislature followed Pickering's recommendations and amended the statute.

• During Pickering's district court confirmation hearing, he swore under oath that he had no interaction with the Mississippi Sovereignty Commission, a state-funded agency established after Brown v. Board of Education to oppose integration efforts. However, a commission investigator wrote a memo in 1972 indicating that Pickering "requested to be advised of developments" regarding some of the commission's investigations.

• In 1993, Pickering published an opinion portraying the "one-person, one-vote" doctrine as "obtrusive."

• As a state senator, Pickering repeatedly voted against measures that would expand electoral opportunities for African Americans after passage of the Voting Rights Act in 1965.

• Pickering used identical language in his opinions in the racial discrimination cases Seeley v. City of Hattiesburg and Johnson v. South Mississippi Home Health, describing each as having "all the hallmarks of a case ... filed simply because an adverse employment decision is made in regard to a protected minority."

• Pickering wrote approximately 1,100 opinions during his 11 years as district judge and published fewer than 100. When the Senate Judiciary Committee asked him for the unpublished decisions, Pickering provided approximately 600 and indicated that the rest were unavailable.

Sources:
NARAL
NAACP
Alliance for Justice
National Women's Law Center
American Association of University Women
People for the American Way

last updated Sept. 24, 2003