Bush choice gets criticisms rare for nominees to Court

On Oct. 22, 1971, President Richard M. Nixon nominated to the Supreme Court a corporate lawyer and former bar association president with no judicial experience. On Dec. 6, his choice, Lewis F. Powell Jr., was confirmed with fanfare by a vote of 89 to 1.

Harriet E. Miers, President Bush's nominee to succeed Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, brings a similar resume, along with five years in the White House and one year as its counsel. But in just three weeks, her nomination has provoked a range of opposition that some scholars say may have no modern precedent.

''I would be very hard pressed to think of a good historical analogy,'' Richard Baker, the Senate historian, said. ''I don't think there is one.''

Though past nominees have faced swift opposition, what makes Ms. Miers's nomination extraordinary, historians say, is the combination of doubts about her philosophy from within the president's own party and attacks on her legal qualifications from both sides of the aisle.

''Harriet Miers is in a real danger zone,'' said Lee Epstein, a political scientist at Washington University in St. Louis who uses statistical models to study public perceptions of past Supreme Court nominees. ''Our models right now are showing that she would get confirmed, but I would be worried if I was the president,'' she said. The early calls for withdrawal, the ''intraparty attacks'' and the questions about her qualifications, Ms. Epstein said, are what make Ms. Miers's nomination ''reasonably unique.''

•	Bush Choice Gets Criticisms Rare for Nominees to Court The New York Times, Monday, Oct. 24, 2005 Byline: David D. Kirkpatrick

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