Newswire

Law Comes Before Personal Views, Alito Says

Alito: I Will Not Impose 'Personal Opinion'

WASHINGTON -- Distancing himself from his past conservative views on abortion and other social matters, Supreme Court nominee Samuel A. Alito Jr. told senators Tuesday that he was now a judge and would not impose his personal opinions on issues that come before him as a member of the nation's highest court.

Alito paid get-acquainted calls at Senate offices again today and sought to play down the significance of a memorandum that he wrote in 1985 in which he disavowed racial and ethnic quotas and said he did not believe the Constitution gave women the right to abortion.

The memo was part of a job application he submitted seeking a political position as the deputy assistant attorney general in the Reagan administration. Its release Monday created heightened concern among liberal senators and advocacy groups that Alito would attempt to legislate his conservative morals from the bench.

After Alito met with Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the only woman on the Senate Judiciary Committee, the California Democrat said she felt assured that Alito would strictly review the law, as she said he has sought to do as a judge on the U.S. 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals since 1990.

Feinstein said Alito told her: "First of all, it was different then. I was an advocate seeking a job. It was a political job. And that was 1985. I'm now a judge, you know. I've been on the Circuit Court for 15 years. And it's very different. I'm not an advocate. I don't give heed to my personal views. What I do is interpret the law."

Feinstein said she was persuaded.

"I believe he was very sincere in what he said," she said. "And he talked about Roe in particular, about (it) having had many reviews."

She said that while Alito did not say that the landmark 1973 Roe vs. Wade decision legalizing abortion was "well settled," he used the Latin phrase "stare decisis" — indicating he thought it should stay as it is.


http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/
nation/la-111505alito_lat,0,5408772.story

Posted by Editor at November 16, 2005 06:24 AM