Bush picks loyalist for Supreme Court

GEORGE Bush yesterday named his friend and White House counsel Harriet Miers to fill the vacancy on the United States Supreme Court created by the retirement this summer of Justice Sandra Day O'Connor.

The US president announced his choice for the last remaining vacancy on the court on the first day of its new term under the leadership of Justice John Roberts, who was confirmed by the Senate last week and officially sworn in as the new chief justice yesterday morning.

Like the former chief justice, William Rehnquist, at the time of his appointment, Ms Miers, 60, has no judicial experience.

Prior to serving as Mr Bush's lawyer she was head of the Texas State Bar and was also the first woman to become president of the Dallas Bar Association.

Mr Bush once described his nominee as "a pit bull in size six shoes".

"She has devoted her life to the rule of law and the cause of justice," the president said yesterday. "She will be an outstanding addition to the Supreme Court of the United States."

If confirmed by the Senate, Ms Miers, a graduate of Southern Methodist University, would be the third woman to serve on the Supreme Court.

Her nomination was not a complete surprise - her name had been spinning through the Washington rumour mill last week - but observers on both sides of the political divide were still somewhat puzzled by Mr Bush's decision not to nominate one of the country's leading conservative jurists.

Even by the standards of an administration characterised by extreme personal devotion to the president, Ms Miers has a reputation for being a loyalist.

She first met Mr Bush in the 1980s and served as counsel to his gubernatorial campaign in 1994.

Prior to assuming her current post she was Mr Bush's staff secretary before being promoted to the position of deputy chief of staff. She succeeded Alberto Gonzales as White House counsel when Mr Gonzales, who had been a candidate for the court himself but was opposed by conservative interest groups, was appointed attorney-general.

"The case for Harriet comes down to [her being a] conservative, confirmable woman," said Brad Berenson, who served as associate White House counsel in George Bush senior's administration.

"It also answers the Senate's suggestion for someone outside the 'judicial monastery'.

"But the real driver is clearly her relationship with the president, which is extremely close and long-standing."

Ms Miers, who was formerly a partner at a large Dallas law firm whose cases will provide the "paper trail" for Democrats to pore over in the absence of any judicial record, said her job was "to be true to the founders' vision of the proper role of the courts in our society" - a nod to conservatives who take a "strict constructionist" view of the constitution believing that much of recent jurisprudence runs counter to the intentions of the Founding Fathers and is, therefore, unconstitutional.

In a further hint about how she views these matters, Ms Miers said: "I will have a tremendous responsibility to keep our judicial system strong and help ensure that the courts meet their obligation to strictly apply the law and the constitution."

Democrats vowed to scrutinise Ms Miers carefully during her confirmation hearings. "We know even less about Harriet Miers than we did about John Roberts, and because this is the critical swing seat on the court, Americans will need to know a lot more about Miers' judicial philosophy and legal background before any vote for confirmation" said Senator Charles Schumer of New York, who sits on the Senate judiciary committee that will conduct the hearings.

Although a conservative, Ms Miers did donate $1,000 to both the Democratic National Committee and to Al Gore's unsuccessful presidential campaign in 1998.

Not all conservatives were happy with Mr Bush's selection. Writing for National Review, the leading conservative weekly magazine, David Frum, a former White House speechwriter called the nomination "an unforced error".

Ms Miers is, according to Mr Frum, "a lovely person: intelligent, honest, capable, loyal, discreet, dedicated... I could pile on the praise all morning. But nobody would describe her as one of the outstanding lawyers in the United States."

Furthermore, he said, the absence of any clear evidence establishing Ms Miers's conservative credentials is troubling.

"We are being asked by this president to take this appointment purely on trust, without any independent reason to support it. And that is not a request conservatives can safely grant," argued Mr Frum.

Ms Miers is something of a blank slate: a fact which worries conservatives and liberals alike, few of whom know quite what to expect from Mr Bush's latest nominee.

Initial reaction from conservatives to Ms Miers's nomination was positive."There's every indication that she's very similar to Judge Roberts - judicial restraint, limited role of the court, basically a judicial conservative," said Greg Mueller, a Republican consultant who works for several conservative advocacy leaders.

Still, the vote of the most conservative Republican senators was not assured and some anti-abortion groups criticised the choice.

"It's not that we don't know anything, and the small pieces of information we do know are disappointing. She's Southern Methodist, notoriously pro-abortion," said Troy Newman of Operation: Rescue, an anti-abortion pressure group.

Mr Bush offered the job to Ms Miers on Sunday night over dinner. He met with her on four occasions during the past couple of weeks, officials said.

Eager to rebut any charges of cronyism, the White House produced statistics showing that 10 of the 34 justices appointed since 1933 had worked for the president who picked them.