Ladies and Gentlemen, place your bets! I expect we will know on Monday, July 11th.
Associate Justice Priscilla Owen
SCNB blog
My best prediction for the President's nominee to replace Sandra Day O'Connor is Priscilla Owen. Here is my thinking.
First, I believe the nominee will be a woman. I think that, for reasons of demographic politics, the White House will view it as preferable, but not absolutely necessary, that Justice O'Connor be succeeded by a woman. But with the very strong prospect that the Chief Justice will retire during President Bush's tenure and provide a second nomination opportunity, the White House is all but certain to conclude that at least one of the two nominees must be a woman.
Faced with the choice of nominating a woman now or later, I think that the President will choose now. As I just noted, the politics of replacing O'Connor with another woman are better. Equally significant, although I obviously don't know whether the President would name Attorney Generally Alberto Gonzales to replace the Chief Justice, I feel confident that he will want at the least to preserve that possibility. The reasons don't need to be rehearsed here, but it is well known that Gonzales has a close personal relationship with the President, who is very loyal and admiring of the Attorney General. (Incidentally, conservative opponents of Gonzales as a consequence have a very strong incentive to press for male candidates now to effectively preclude a Gonzales nomination later.) |
