All About A Guy Named John
He's brilliant, likable, a lawyer's lawyer. Why Judge Roberts is in for the grilling of his life
Liberal groups have mined Roberts's documents from his time as an assistant attorney general and associate counsel to the president during the Reagan administration and principal deputy solicitor during the elder Bush's administration. They contend that the documents reveal Roberts as a zealous young conservative, unsympathetic to women's issues: He once referred to justification of Roe as the "so-called" right to privacy and to gender disparities as "purported."
Roberts's writings are peppered with smart-alecky asides--he calls a Girl Scout seeking a cookie-selling photo with the president a "little huckster." And he occasionally gives pause to some conservatives. Roberts suggested that Bob Jones, a Reagan supporter, be told to "go soak his head" for pestering the administration for a favor. As a private lawyer, Roberts once provided pro bono advice to a group of gay activists.
If he wins confirmation by a comfortable margin, as expected, it would be the realization of a dream for Roberts, who told law school classmate Mark Rosen he wanted to be either a Harvard law professor or a Supreme Court justice. "He truly loved the law," says Rosen, now a Philadelphia lawyer. "He was not a fire breather then, not a right-wing ideologue. The real question now is, who is the real John Roberts?"
Maybe by the end of the week, we'll all have a better idea.
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