Just after Justice Sandra Day O’Connor wrote her resignation letter, two of the supposed names on the Bush short list were two conservative female judges of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, both based in New Orleans: Edith Jones and Edith Clement. Of course, John Roberts is now being nominated for Chief Justice and the O’Connor seat still needs to be filled. I have post-Katrina inkling that the President might find it very politically expedient to appoint a) a woman and b) a judge from New Orleans (although neither is a native).
What say you?
Edith Clement isn’t a native, but I think she spent her entire adult life in NO. She got her degree from Tulane and stayed.
Edith Brown Clement is also, by universal judgment of the two people (one liberal, one ultra-conservative) I know who have made her acquaintance in a professional capacity, an intellectual lightweight. She is therefore a perfect pick for this president, separate and apart from her current state citizenship.
“Even if [Carswell] is mediocre, there are a lot of mediocre judges and people and lawyers. They are entitled to a little representation, aren’t they; a little chance? We can’t have all Brandeises, Cardozos, and Frankfurters, and stuff like that there.”-Sen. Hruska
While it’s a fact of life that clients are often kind of dumb, and though I always hope opposing counsel will be kind of thick, I invariably hate it when my judge is stupid. Stupidity creates unpredictabilty, and I hate unpredictability in the law.