Usnik said the paper dropped the matter after learning that the records were sealed.
Posted on Fri, Aug. 05, 2005
Sen. Hutchison: Roberts line crossed
BY TODD J. GILLMAN
The Dallas Morning News
WASHINGTON - (KRT) - Citing "simple decency," Texas Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison demanded Friday that journalists quit poking around for details on Supreme Court nominee John Roberts' adopted children.
"Some boundaries should be placed on inquiries into the private lives of public figures," said Hutchison, who faced some uncomfortable questions after she adopted her son and daughter four years ago, when she was 58 and husband Ray Hutchison was 68.
With a month to go before Roberts' confirmation hearings, news media and interest groups continue to scour his record.
Some have also focused on other aspects of his life. On Thursday, the online Drudge Report revealed that a New York Times reporter had made inquiries about the Roberts children, Josephine and Jack, ages 5 and 4.
According to recent news reports, the judge and his wife, Jane, wed in 1996 when both were 41 and adopted the children in 2000.
On Friday, The Times said no one had ordered an investigation of the adoptions, calling the inquiry part of a routine effort to "report extensively on the life and career" of a nominee for high office.
"Our reporters made initial inquiries about the adoptions, as they did about many other aspects of his background. They did so with great care, understanding the sensitivity of the issue," said Times spokesman Toby Usnik. "We have not pursued the issue after the initial inquiries, which detected nothing irregular about the adoptions."
The newspaper denied assertions by conservative bloggers that it consulted lawyers about trying to unseal the adoption records. Usnik said the paper dropped the matter after learning that the records were sealed.
Hutchison called the newspaper's actions "reprehensible," saying the inquiry crossed the "fine line between legitimate background inquiries and invasion of privacy."
The National Council for Adoption also denounced the inquiry, saying the adoptions have no bearing on the judge's suitability to serve.
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© 2005, The Dallas Morning News.
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