Judicial Nominations
Although Supreme Court nominations are the most highly publicized, the lower federal court nominations play a vital role in in our judicial system. The current administration has recognized this as critical and is currently flooding the Courts with judicial ideologues. Bush is turning the judiciary over to the very far right wing of his party, which will mean an era of extreme conservative judicial activism. If he continues to drive the federal courts in the direction he is heading, rights all Americans cherish will be gutted, including a women’s right to choose safe and legal abortion.
Pending Anti-Choice Nominees
United States Circuit Court Nominees
None of Bush’s 47 Court of Appeals nominees has endorsed the legal foundation of Roe v. Wade, and at least 14 have clear anti-choice records.
Currently pending before the Senate are the following anti-choice nominations:
Priscilla Owen, repeatedly tried to rewrite Texas law from the bench in order to deny young women their right to choose.
Charles Pickering, led the Republican Party to respond to Roe v. Wade with an anti-choice plank to the party platform calling for an amendment to the U.S. Constitution to ban abortion.
Carolyn Kuhl, working in the Reagan Department of Justice, urged the Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade.
Bill Pryor, recently reaffirmed his position that Roe v. Wade was the worst abomination in the history of constitutional law.
Michael Fisher, as a candidate for the Republican Gubernatorial nomination in 2002 told a Pittsburgh television station that he “would sign a bill to outlaw abortions.”
Claude Allen, as the number two official at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, helped to extend legal recognition of embryos and fetuses and continues to promote abstinence unless married programs, which censor discussion of contraception. As a public official in Virginia, Allen supported several restrictions on the right to
choose; and as a spokesman for Jesse Helms, Allen compared abortion to genocide.
Janice Rogers Brown, as a justice on the California Supreme Court, demonstrated her opposition to a woman’s right to privacy when she wrote a caustic dissent to a ruling that a parental consent law with respect to abortion violated the state constitution’s right to privacy.
The Senate has confirmed the following anti-choice nominees:
John Roberts, working in the Bush I Department of Justice, urged the Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade.
Timothy M. Tymkovich testified to the U.S. Senate that states should not have to use Medicaid funds to pay for abortions in cases of rape or incest.
Deborah Cook is endorsed by Ohio Right to Life and has agreed that a woman may be subjected to child abuse laws for harm done to her fetus.
Jeffrey Howard supports banning certain common, safe abortion procedures and requiring parental notification before young women could receive abortion services.
Lavenski Smith represented the Unborn Child Amendment Committee in its lawsuit to bar all abortions, except those to save the life of the woman, from being performed by University of Arkansas hospital staff or in hospital facilities.
Michael McConnell supports a constitutional amendment banning legal abortion and is opposed to the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act (FACE).
John Rogers, working in the Reagan Department of Justice, urged the Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade. | 
