(The AFL-CIO issued the following press release on June 8.)
WASHINGTON — The U.S. Senate today confirmed 56-43 Janice Rogers Brown, one of President George W. Bush’s most extremist nominees, for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit—the second most powerful court in America. The District of Columbia Circuit hears challenges to workplace safety rules and hears more labor law cases than any other federal circuit court. The court’s decisions have national reach and affect the lives of tens of millions of workers and their families.
While serving on the California Supreme Court, Brown authored many confrontational and harsh opinions—often in dissent—that would seriously undermine civil rights and workers’ rights. Brown, whose appointment is for a lifetime, has said senior citizens “cannibalize” their grandchildren by trying to get as much “free stuff” as the political system allows. She also has argued the First Amendment protects the use of racial harassment in the form of slurs in the workplace.
Brown’s Record ‘Appalling’
Wade Henderson, executive director of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights says Brown’s “record on civil rights and discrimination cases is not just troubling—it is appalling.”
“Her record demonstrates not just hostility, but active antagonism toward victims of discrimination,” says Henderson. “She has proven time and again that she has little or no respect for established precedent or the law. And most disturbingly, she is entirely unable, or unwilling, to keep her ideological preferences off the bench and outside the court room.”
“Her record leaves no doubt that she would attempt to impose her own extreme views on people’s everyday lives, instead of following the law,” says Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.).
Minutes prior to the vote, Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.) led a delegation of Congressional Black Caucus members in a march to the Senate’s chambers to highlight their opposition to Brown’s nomination.
Senate Set to Consider More Extremist Nominees
Democrats had blocked a handful of Bush nominees using the filibuster, including Brown, because of their bad records on workers’ rights, civil rights and other important working family issues. In May, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) threatened to set in motion a process to circumvent Senate rules and end filibusters for judicial nominees.
The vote on Brown followed a recent agreement reached last month by a bipartisan group of senators to preserve the right to filibuster judicial nominees in which Democrats agreed not to block votes on several Bush nominees, including Brown and Priscilla Owen, who won Senate confirmation in a 56–43 vote May 25.
Several other controversial judicial nominees will come up for Senate votes, beginning with former Alabama Attorney General William Pryor for the 11th Circuit. As the state’s top lawyer, he authored or joined numerous briefs challenging the constitutionality of a host of federal employment protections, including the Family and Medical Leave Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Age Discrimination in Employment Act and the Fair Labor Standards Act.