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Action Needed
Background
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More on Judicial Nominees
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Stand Up for Women's Rights—Protest All Judicial Nominees Who Do Not Support Women's and Civil Rights
Action Needed:
Please use this link to tell your senators that you expect them to vote against all judges who do not support constitutional and civil rights for all people, regardless of their gender, ethnicity or religion. Senate Republicans are grouping the nominations of three right-wing women judges—Priscilla Owen, Carolyn Kuhl and Janice Rogers Brown—together for a cloture vote on Friday in an attempt to paint groups who oppose the nominations as anti-woman.
We must not allow this charge to go unanswered. The administration is going out of its way to find nominees, both male and female, who oppose our civil and constitutional rights. By grouping these three women together, the administration is playing politics with women's lives, employing a stunt instead of engaging in serious dialogue.
Before the cloture vote is held on Friday, every senator needs to hear from his or her constituents. If your senator is a Democrat, urge her or him to stay strong and protect women's rights by voting against these three "anti-woman" jurists. If your senator is a Republican, tell her or him that women do not appreciate their playing games with their rights. Please contact your senator today.
Background:
The Republican Senate leadership has announced that it has scheduled a 30-hour talkathon about judicial nominations while "Rome" (the economy, Iraq, Afghanistan, etc.) burns. Stealing from the Nixon play book, the members of the Republican Senate leadership think they can change the subject and distract the American public from the real problems facing this nation. Incredibly, they believe that the public will be outraged and democracy threatened by the Democratic filibuster of four judicial nominees. This notion becomes more preposterous when coupled with the fact that the Democrats have already confirmed 168 less notorious judicial nominees.
Adding insult to injury, Senate Republicans are grouping the nominations of three right-wing women judges—Priscilla Owen, Carolyn Kuhl and Janice Rogers Brown—together for a cloture vote on Friday in an attempt to paint those groups who oppose those nominations as anti-woman. Do they think that it is believable that the more than 105 organizations that oppose these nominees—including National Organization for Women, The National Women's Law Center, the American Association for University Women, the NOW Legal Defense Fund, the Feminist Majority, People for the American Way, NARAL Pro-Choice America, the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, AFSCME, Mexican American Legal Defense Fund, and Sierra Club—could credibly be labeled "anti-women"?
The Bush administration's hostility towards women and minorities is amply demonstrated by the right wing jurists it has nominated to fill vacancies on the Courts of Appeal. Senate Republicans just play into the hands of such misogyny and racism by moving in lock-step to confirm judges who oppose our most cherished constitutional rights.
As sitting lower court judges, Janice Rogers Brown, Carolyn Kuhl and Priscilla Owen have clear and indisputable records which reveal their contempt toward the legal rights for women:
- Janice Rogers Brown—In a speech, Rogers Brown displayed her disdain for the rights of senior citizens, when she stated "today's senior citizens blithely cannibalize their grandchildren because they have a right to get as much free stuff as the political system will permit them to extract." ("Fifty Ways to Lose your Freedom" speech at the Institute for Justice, 8/12/00). When the California Supreme Court struck down an abortion restriction, she protested in dissent that the majority decision subjected the restriction to an "inherently insurmountable" level of scrutiny. In that same case she argued that judicial decision making should rest on "natural law." (American Academy of Pediatrics v. Lungren, 1997).
- Carolyn Kuhl—As a Justice Department Attorney in the 1980s she urged the Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade and supported the Virginia Military Institute's record of discrimination against women applicants. On the L.A. Superior Court, Kuhl dismissed a breach of privacy claim of a breast cancer patient whose doctor had invited a drug salesman to observe her breast examination. Kuhl said that it was not reasonable for a woman to expect privacy in her doctor's examination room. As Deputy Solicitor General, Kuhl signed an amicus brief siding with an employer charged with sexual harassment. (Meritor Savings Bank, FSB v. Vinson, 1986).
- Priscilla Owen—As a Texas Supreme Court Justice, Owen went out of her way to ignore legislative intent by attempting to limit minors' access to judicial bypass as an alternative to parental notification for young women who sought abortions. Even Alberto Gonzales, President Bush's White House Counsel and then a fellow Texas Supreme Court Justice called her position "an unconscionable act of judicial activism." (In re Doe I (II), 2000). She consistently rules for big business, has accepted campaign contributions from Enron and ruled in their favor, and is known to be the most anti-plaintiff justice on the very conservative Texas Supreme Court.
Again, please use this link to tell your senators that you expect them to vote against all judges who do not support fundamental constitutional rights for all, regardless of gender, ethnicity or religion.
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