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The forces that molded Judge Alito
Family and the law figure prominently in shaping the
character of court nominee.
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR
By Warren Richey
November 21, 2005
http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/1121/p02s01-uspo.html
The man who could be the nation's next Supreme Court justice
is smart, hard-working, quiet, self-effacing, even shy. But if you
really want to understand appeals court judge Samuel Alito, focus on
three things, say those who know him best: his family, the law, and the
Philadelphia Phillies.
They paint a picture of a busy judge, the father of two,
sorting through legal briefs among spectators in the stands at school
swim meets, or taking his kids - and law clerks - to root for his
beloved Phillies.
"When he was coaching his son's baseball team, he would
leave the office wearing a full baseball uniform," says Jeffrey
Wasserstein, a law clerk for Judge Alito in 1997-98. "Here is a
federal judge leaving the office in cleats and those stirrup socks and
everything."
Since his nomination to the US Supreme Court by President
Bush on Oct. 31, Judge Alito has come under attack by liberal analysts
and a coalition of women's rights and civil rights groups who say he is
a conservative ideologue. But longtime associates and friends of the
Alito family say Alito is very much a reflection of his parents, Rose,
who still lives in Alito's boyhood home in Hamilton Township, N.J., and
Sam Sr., who died in 1987. He is motivated more by intellect and public
service, they say, than a quest for wealth or political power.
"His father came [from Italy] as a 14-year-old
immigrant, and by the time he was in his 20s he was teaching high school
English," says Jack Lacy, a former Hamilton Township councilman and
family friend for 50 years. "To me that is quite an accomplishment,
considering he came here speaking Italian."
Sam Sr. went on to run the Legislative Services Commission at
the New Jersey legislature. It was a nonpartisan research office tasked
to assist lawmakers in the intensely partisan state legislature.
"Sam Alito Sr. was a highly principled man who would not
bend to political pressure," Mr. Lacy says. "Regardless of who
was in power, Mr. Alito did not lower the standards of that office to
meet political expediency."
Albert Parroni worked closely with Alito's father and now
runs the same office. "I think young Sam knew what Sam Sr. was
going through" working at the center of what could be at times a
partisan hornet's nest, says Mr. Parroni. He says Judge Alito has
carried his father's tight-lipped, nonpartisan stance onto the federal
bench.
Others agree with this assessment. "Sam is in my view a
genuinely apolitical person," says Daniel Rabinowitz, a classmate
at Yale Law School who also served with Alito in the US Attorney's
Office in Newark, N.J. "He was imbued with a sense of nonpartisan
public service from his dad."
Mr. Rabinowitz, who describes himself as a "yellow dog
Democrat," adds: "That's why I have a hard time fitting Sam
into any kind of partisan category. We've been friends for 30 years, I
assume he's a registered Republican, but I don't even know that.
David Loretto, an Alito clerk in 2002-03, describes a similar
experience.
"I'm extremely liberal," he says. "I've had
friends come up to me and say, 'I didn't know you worked for such an
extremely conservative judge.' "
Mr. Loretto smiles. "My reply was: Neither did I."
Alito's reticence makes it almost impossible to tell how and
where his conservatism was shaped - and even how conservative he may be.
A rare break in that nonpartisan posture came 20 years ago when Alito
was applying for a job in the Reagan administration. "I am and
always have been a conservative," his cover letter began. He
detailed his admiration for the writings of William F. Buckley and his
opposition to many of the liberal rulings of the Supreme Court under
Chief Justice Earl Warren. He emphasized that it was his strong personal
belief that "the Constitution does not protect a right to an
abortion."
Last week, the judge backed away from those comments, saying
he was "an advocate seeking a job" 20 years ago and is now
older and wiser.
In addition to the 1985 cover letter, supporters and
detractors are poring through his extensive record on the federal bench
- participation in some 3,500 decisions, including 300 opinions written
by him - to draw a bead on his politics.
In the meantime, there appears to be no shortage of Alito
supporters - from his hometown of Hamilton Township to the halls of the
US Attorney's Office in Newark, N.J., and the Third US Circuit Court of
Appeals in Philadelphia.
"Judge Alito really is a wonderful person, a terrific
guy," says Monica Dolin, who was an Alito law clerk in 1993-94 and
who says she's a registered Democrat. "I'm not positive what kind
of justice he is going to be, but I trust him enormously."
Ms. Dolin is among a group of former Alito clerks who signed
a letter to the US Senate urging his confirmation. Of the 54 clerks
Alito has hired since 1990, all but three signed the letter. (The three
said such an endorsement would conflict with job obligations.)
One potential bump on Alito's road to confirmation is whether
he failed to abide by a 1990 pledge to recuse himself from deciding
cases involving a mutual fund, a brokerage house, and his sister's law
firm.
Alito has denied any wrongdoing. "To my knowledge I have
not ruled in a case for which I had a legal or ethical obligation to
recuse myself," he wrote in a letter to Senate Judiciary Committee
Chairman Arlen Specter. "I am proud of the record I have
established during my 15 years on the federal bench, not only in terms
of my jurisprudence but my integrity."
The issue is likely to arise again during his confirmation
hearing in January. Associates and long-time friends say ethics
questions about Alito are a nonstarter.
"I've seen him under stress when difficult decisions
needed to be made, and in every instance his views were informed not
only by his extensive learning, high intelligence, and wit, but also
[by] bedrock decency and honesty," says Rabinowitz, the Yale
classmate and former colleague.
As a student at Yale Law School Alito was known to prefer
studying over socializing, living a conservative lifestyle. "He
didn't drive flashy cars or go out dancing all night. He went home and
studied," says Mark Dwyer, a classmate at Princeton and Alito's
roommate at Yale Law.
Bill Agress, who hasn't seen Alito since 1966 when they were
debate team partners in high school, remembers something else. "We
won most of our debates," he says. But "when we were doing
research some people back then in high school played a little loose with
the facts. Statistics suddenly changed," Mr. Agress says. "Sam
would never do that. When Sam did the research the facts were the
facts."
Such earnestness has not dampened Alito's sense of humor.
When a neighboring judge in the federal court-house in Newark positioned
a pair of ornamental lions in the hallway guarding the door to her
chambers, Alito deployed plastic pink flamingos outside his chambers.
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