Bush picks conservative to head SC

The announcement ended more than two weeks of speculation set off by Justice O’Connor’s surprise retirement. Among the frantic rumours around the decision came hints from some Republicans that he might choose a woman to succeed the Supreme Court’s first female justice.

Justice O’Connor had long ago emerged as the fulcrum of the current court, a pivotal vote on abortion, affirmative action, the death penalty and religion. Judge Roberts’s detailed views on many of those issues are less known. But he arouses nothing like the opposition that conservatives leveled at another potential nominee, Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales.

By the same token, Judge Roberts will be more difficult for Democrats to attack than his friend and fellow appellate court judge, J. Michael Luttig, one of the more conservative among those mentioned for the job.

Bush repeated his wish to have Justice O’Connor’s successor confirmed by the time the Supreme Court begins its next term on the first Monday in October, and went out of his way to emphasise the past bipartisan support Roberts has enjoyed.

In his own remarks on Tuesday night, Judge Roberts offered no substantive comments, but told how he ‘‘always got a lump in (his) throat’’ when he appeared before the Supreme Court as a lawyer.

Judge Roberts is widely regarded as personable, no small consideration for a president who has said he wanted to take the personal measure of any nominee to the court. The bipartisan lawyers’ letter supporting his nomination to his current job described him as ‘‘one of the very best and most highly respected appellate lawyers in the nation.’’

—New York Times

Who’s Justice Roberts

• Summa cum laude Harvard graduate

• Clerk to William H. Rehnquist, who was then an SC associate justice

• Public career begins with Reagan administration as aide to Attorney General William French Smith from 1981 to 1982, then associate White House counsel

• 1986-89, 1993-03: Private practice

• Advisor to Jeb Bush during 2000 Florida recount

• 2003: Current post on the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit