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Thursday, September 29, 2005
AFTER ROBERTS C0NRRMAT10N
Battle brews over nominee
Continued from page 1A
thyroid cancer. He hopes the
Senate will confirm Roberts
by Oct. 3, the beginning of the
Supreme Court session.
Meeinwhile, the president,
who has expressed his admi
ration for ultra conservatives
Antonin Scalia and Clarence
Thomas, is preparing to
appoint another justice to suc
ceed O’Connor. Bush met this
week with Senate leaders to
discuss O’Connor’s replace
ment.
While Senate Democratic
leader Harry Reid of Nevada
issued a statement asking
Bush to nominate another
justice like O’Connor, whom
he described as having “a
voice of reason and modera
tion,” some rights leaders are
doubtful that will happen.
“This is the fii-st time in 11
years that we’ve had a
Supreme Court vacancy, the
longest time since 1823,” says
Ralph Neas, president of the
People for the American Way
He says while PFAW has
adamantly opposed Roberts
and many federal judges over
the past decade, the oi^aniza-
tion’s researchers have con
stantly been on the offensive,
stockpiling a database of judi
cial records of judges that
Gay men
at risk
Continued from page 1A
HIV between the ages of 20
and 24 .”
As bleak as those numbers
are, they are even bleaker
for young gay men.
‘Tn a shocking study the
CDC released in June 2005,
46 percent of black men of all
ages who have sex with men
in five mfyor cities tested
positive for HTV, “ the report
observed.
‘'While the threat of HIV
must be understood as a
danger to the lives of all
African- American young
people, the munbers are
especially troubling for cer
tain groujSs in black conmiu-
nities, specifically yoimg
black men who have sex
with men and young
Afiican- American women,”
said Cathy Cohen, a
University of Chicago profes
sor and co-author of the
report with Alexandria Bell
and Mosi Ifatui\ji.
Patterson, a recent Payne
College graduate, joined
Leaders in the Fight to
Eradicate AIDS, or LI FE.
AIDS, a student-nm organi
zation that recently kicked
off* its second annual Student
Tbach-in and Tbwn Hall
meeting at Howard
University
‘It’s not helping our com
munity when we have indi
viduals who are not walking
with integrity by being hon
est witli themselves and
with sisters,” said Patterson,
referring to the increased
concern involving Black men
who have sex secretly with
men and women, commonly
known as ‘The down low.”
“As a black gay man I
would not want to haVe rela
tions with a brother who was
secretly going behind my
back and then going back to
his wife, knocking her up
and possibly infecting them
and putting them at risk,”
said Patterson. ‘You are not
doing yourself any good and
particularly not doing the
gay and Black community as
a whole any good by you liv
ing a double life. It’s all about
loving each other and being
responsible because that’s
how we’re going to end this ”
Not only does accountabili
ty and responsibility need to
increase in the black homo
sexual community,
Patterson said, but also
among heterosexuals.
Shauna Cooper. a
Langston University stu
dent, agrees.
She said that an “air of
invindbilit/' among young
Afiican-Americans often
serves as a conduit for con
tracting HIV’!
Bush may nominate in order
to be ready to educate and
mobilize the public.
While civil rights leaders
have asked Reid to hold
Democrats together the best
he can, Neas says Democrats
should also use the filibuster
if necessary “The filibuster is
still alive. I think they’re
reserving that right.”
After a group of 14
Democrats cut a deal with
Republicans to allow three
Far Right judges to be con
firmed for federal courts last
spring, Mary Frances Berry
former chair of the U.S.
Commission on Civil Ri^ts,
says the Democrats have
given up their chance to fili
buster by allowing ultra-con
servatives to be confirmed
unchallenged.
“When they caved in on the
filibuster, they lost the oppor
tunity to stop Roberts or to
stop anybody because no mat
ter how bad any nominee is,
some of the Democrats who
were in that filibuster deal
said they didn’t think where a
nominee stood on the issue
should be a reason to fili
buster,” says Berry a consti
tutional scholar. ‘Tf they are
not willing to filibustei*, then
they’ve lost their first line of
defense. All they can hope for
is that some Republican
would switch fiom their party
and vote with them to stop
the fi^t.”
That’s not likely to happen.
Conservatives applauded the
Roberts namination.
Therefore, Berry says, the
only strategy left is for civil
rights leaders and Democrats
to clearly state the weakness
es of the nominees so when
they make decisions adverse
to civil rights, “Then we can
say at least the civil ri^ts
community tried to alert you”
Setting a standard for fair
judges before they are nomi
nated is a strategy in and of
itsejf, says Tbd Shaw, director-
counsel of the NAACP Legal
Defense and Educational
Fund. “We are not saying just
because someone is conserva
tive, we will oppose them. We
are eigainst people who are
antinirivil ri^ts, who are
closed-minded and mission
driven. There are people who
are intdlectually or distinc
tively conservative, but who
are open-minded and who
will review the facts and the
law and will make determina
tions based upon the merits,”
Shaw says.
But Shaw insists that civil
ri^ts leaders must not relax
their opposition to Roberts
while waiting on the next
nominee no matter how sure
the Roberts confirmation
seems.
“We don’t know who is the
next nominee for the seat
... In terms of strategizing, we
don’t even know wheth^ we
will have to take a position or
not,” Shaw says.
Meanwhile, civil rights
leaders — in a strategy of thdr
own - took the fiont lines
before the Senate Judiciary
Committee to oppc»e Roberts.
“The stakes are hi^er than
ever. We cannot afford to ele
vate an individual to such a
powerful, life-time position,
whose record demonstrates
such a strong desire to reverse
the hard-won civil rights
gains that so many sacrificed
so much to achieve,” said U. S.
Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.)
before the committee. “We
cannot afford to go back We
must go forward to the cre
ation of one Amoica.”
Wade Henderson, executive
director of the Leadership
Conference on Civil Rights, a
coalition of more than 180
socially active groups, said
“The test is wheth^ Judge
Roberts has demonstrated
[that] he is committed to the
fundamental principles on
which our country was found
ed and whether his vision of
America matches the e3q)ecta-
tions of mainstream
Americans. Judge Roberts
has failed this test.”
LDF Senior Staff* Attorney
Leslie ProU says fighting is
the key strategy She noted
how ‘ Senate Democrats
stopped two consecutive
Nixon nominees to the hi^
court, Harold Carswell and
Clement Haynesworth
“They were both defeated
because the civil rights com
munity rc^ up,” says Proll,
who lobbies on Capitol Hill.
But this case is different.
Some Democrats may sup
port Roberts. Even liberal
Democratic Sens. Dianne
Feinstein (Calif) and Charles
E. Schumer (N. Y) have said
they are undecided about
their Roberts vote.
‘Tfs going to be impossible
to defeat him unless he turns
out to be an ax murderer and
there’s been no evidence of
that presented,” Berry scoffs.
‘It’s up to the civil rights
groups to make the best case
they can make.”
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