Light posting for a spell: I am in the process of preparing for my last sitting with the judge, so posting here at SA will be a little on the light side for a while. I will, however, continue to provide daily updates on Bill Pryor's pending nomination to the Eleventh Circuit.

Southern Appeal's greatest hits on Bill Pryor's nomination to the Eleventh Circuit:

January 6, 2003: "Bush may appoint a Southern Federalist to the Eleventh Circuit"

April 9, 2003: "Pryor nominated to Eleventh Circuit"

April 14, 2003:

-"Sam Heldman on Bill Pryor's record as Alabama attorney general"

-"Heldman responds (kind of)"

April 15, 2003:

-"Pryor articles"

-"Feddie v. Heldman"

April 16, 2003: "The latest attack on Pryor by Sam Heldman"

April 18, 2003: "Roll Pryor Roll! (to a quick confirmation that is)"

April 25, 2003: "More articles on Bill Pryor's nomination to the Eleventh Circuit"

April 26, 2003: "Judge Bill Pryor"

April 28, 2003: "Pryor's restraint"

April 29, 2003: "Response to Sam Heldman's criticism of "Pryor's Restraint"

April 30, 2003:

-"Sekulow defends Pryor"

-"More on Pryor"

May 2, 2003:

-"More Pryor, More Heldman"

-"A retraction? I don't think so"

-"The Pryor/IOLTA debate rages on"

May 5, 2003:

-"Pryor editorials"

-"Pryor's amicus brief in Lawrence v. Texas"

May 6, 2003:

-"Pryor's nomination: His supporters and detractors"

-"More nonsense from the left on the Pryor nomination"

May 7, 2003:

-"More nonsense from Pryor bashers"

-"The truth about Bill Pryor"

May 8, 2003:

-"Pryor responds to his critics"

-"Speculation about Pryor's replacement"

May 9, 2003: "Heldman's take on Bill Pryor's press release"

May 12, 2003:

-"Pryor profile on NPR"

-"The truth about Pryor is, he's well qualified"

May 13, 2003: "Nominees Court Controversy: Bush's judge picks meet resistance"

May 15, 2003:

-"Pryor's opponents"

-"Insight into Pryor's judicial philosophy"

May 16, 2003: "Today's Pryor article"

May 17, 2003: "More on Pryor"

May 19, 2003:

-"The New York Times comes out against Pryor's nomination"

-"Pryor's amicus brief in Lawrence v. Texas"

May 20, 2003: "Pryor defends conviction of former Klansman before state appellate court"

May 21, 2003: "Constitution is not a wish list"

May 22, 2003: "W's Christian nation"

May 23, 2003:

-"The sterling character of Bill Pryor"

-"TalkLeft attacks Pryor (again) and Feddie brings down the hammer"

May 24, 2003: "General William H. Pryor Jr., 'a conservative true believer'"

June 4, 2003:

-"SJC: Bill Pryor's hearing date getting close"

-"It's official: Pryor hearing set for next week"

June 5, 2003: "What you can expect to hear from the penumbra loving lefties on the SJC at Pryor's hearing"

June 6, 2003:

-"Bring it: "Pryor likely in for bruising fight in confirmation hearing"

-"Let Pryor be Pryor"

-"Free Congress believes that Pryor will likely be filibustered"

-"More on the possibility, or lack thereof, of a Pryor filibuster"

June 7, 2003: "Bill Pryor Senate Confirmation Hearing"

June 9, 2003:

-"Pryor to face U.S. Senate committee Wednesday"

-"The dems' wait and see approach?"

-"ACLJ (not U) issues press release in support of Bill Pryor"

June 10, 2003:

-"Bill Pryor's Turn"

-"Welcome NRO readers"

-"Pryor blasted by critics in twin reports"

-"Pryor is 'Red meat for Dems'"

-"The Alliance for Justice's report on Bill Pryor"

-"Using the enemy's assets against them"

-"Pro-Pryor report is on the way"

-"Log Cabin (i.e., Gay) Republicans oppose Pryor"

-"Nominees come under heavy ire"

-"Opposition groups mobilize as Pryor goes for confirmation hearing":

-"Pryor, another contentious Bush nominee, faces hearing"

-"American United for Character Assassination"

-"Glad to be of service"

-"Jason Blair's rag gives its take on the Pryor nomination"

-"Birkenstock crowd not happy with Pryor"

-"The AJC editorial board comes out against Pryor (quite the shocker, I know)"

-"Fidelity to federalism"

June 11, 2003:

-"Bar group split on Pryor for judgeship"

-"Pryor articles 'o the day"

-"C-SPAN2 coverage of Pryor hearing?"

-"NPR previews Pryor's hearing before the SJC"

-"Concern over using PFAW's free e-mail/fax service to support Pryor"

This list should bring you up to date on almost anything written on Pryor's nomination in the mainstream media over the past few months. Thanks again for stopping by, and be sure to come back for more commentary, links, etc. on the Pryor nomination.

Welcome NRO readers: It's nice to have y'all here. I am in the process of compiling a list of my prior Pryor posts (say that five times real fast), so if you aren't inclined to going digging around my archives check back in a few hours and I should have something up by then.

Thanks to Jonathan Adler for the "shout out." It is much appreciated.

Replacing Zell: The 2004 Georgia Senate race just got very interesting.

Men of the world unite! Fight the female power structure (i.e., the good 'ol gal network): I guess this is what a Title VII "smoking gun" case looks like.

The merits of the newest amendments to the federal tax code: There's a fairly civil tax policy debate going on over at Yglesias's blog that some of you might find interesting.

Update: And here's another thread from Yglesias's blog on that same topic.

The Midwest is nice, but . . .: this article makes me long to be back in my native Southland. And in less than three months, I will be. :)

Tax Cuts are not nearly large enough, but it's a start: President Bush will sign a tax bill into law today that amounts to a 10-year, $350 billion package of tax rebates, lower rates, new breaks for businesses and investors, and aid to states.

Georgia's "flaggers" need to get a life: These idiots do nothing be reinforce negative stereotypes about the South.

It's time for the Rehnquisitor and Sandy Day to go: And this opinion just places an exclamation point on that sentiment.

I am not terribly surprised by Sandy Day's decision to turn her back on States' rights and the Court's recent federalism jurisprudence, but for Rehnquist to do so is unacceptable and constitutes yet another stain on his tenure as Chief Justice (see also Dickerson). The Chief is, IMHO, but a shadow of his former self. It is time for him to ride off into the sunset before he does any more damage to his legacy.

"The right way to judge": To begin with, one should never take anything that Nan Aron (of the Alliance for Justice) has to say about judging seriously.

"Rick Santorum is right": That's Robert P. George's view, and I agree wholeheartedly.

General William H. Pryor Jr., "a conservative true believer": So sayeth the AJC in this article hot off the wires.



There is also a link to a touching article on the same page that discusses the origins of Pryor's pro-life views.

Justice Clarence Thomas: The man I would give my right arm to clerk for, and the ultimate Southern Federalist.

Hip to be square: It's good to see that the young-ens are finally starting to see the light.

Yglesias on "selfishness": This kid isn't right about much, but I enjoy reading his blog and this post is quite good.

TalkLeft attacks Pryor (again) and Feddie brings down the hammer: I love referring to myself in the third person moniker (that would have made a great Seinfeld episode). You can read TalkLeft's post and my response here. (Thanks to Sam Heldman for the heads up on this one).

Daniel, Mr. Poon, and Taint, one of y'all should email the Talk Left people and find out why they post such weak criticisms. I think TL needs the help of some intelligent liberals like y'all or Sam. My seven year old son could have made a more convincing argument against Pryor's nomination than the one highlighted by TL from an "accomplished" defense attorney. Go read em's beef with General Pryor. What a joke.

The sterling character of Bill Pryor: In addition to being eminently qualified to serve as a federal appellate judge, General Pryor is also a man of the highest character. But none of that matters to the leftist extremists opposing his nomination. They only care about three things: abortion on demand, defining deviancy down, and racial politics.

"W's Christian nation": Here's an anti-Christian rant by The American Prospect, a liberal rag, that includes the following attack on President Bush's judicial nominees:

Even when working in the federal government and responding to Christian-right legal groups, however, lawyers can only go so far to make America more hospitable to Christianity. To achieve their objectives, Christian conservatives have long realized they need sympathetic judges on the bench as well -- judges whose worldviews are suffused with religiosity. Judges, in short, such as Antonin Scalia.

In a January 2002 speech at the University of Chicago Divinity School, Scalia cited his religious views in order to defend the death penalty. He further argued that democracy has a tendency to "obscure the divine authority behind government" -- a situation that people of faith should approach with "the resolution to combat it as effectively as possible." As Princeton University historian Sean Wilentz wrote in a New York Times critique, Scalia "seeks to abandon the intent of the Constitution's framers and impose views about government and divinity that no previous justice, no matter how conservative, has ever embraced."

Bush has explicitly stated that he sees Scalia and Clarence Thomas as models for his judicial nominees. And most of them do fit the mold. On the church-state front, the most outrageous example is the nomination of Alabama Attorney General Bill Pryor for a seat on the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Pryor is notorious for his defense of Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore, who has steadily fought to post the Ten Commandments in his courthouse. Almost as troubling is University of Utah law professor Michael McConnell, one of the intellectual giants behind the "accommodationist" approach to the First Amendment's religion clauses, who was confirmed for a post on the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. McConnell's exaggerated notion of religious free exercise led him to criticize a 1983 U.S. Supreme Court ruling revoking Bob Jones University's tax-exempt status because of its ban on interracial dating, which he dubbed a failure "to intervene to protect religious freedom from the heavy hand of government."

Many of Bush's other judicial nominees, such as Miguel Estrada and Priscilla Owen, have also been resolutely championed by religious conservatives. "A few of [the nominees] have specific histories on religion issues," explains People for the American Way legal director Elliot Mincberg. But the religious right, he adds, is "smart enough" to realize that conservative legal positions tend to come together in one package.

O.k., folks, how many errors, misrepresentations, or outright lies can you spot in this article?

The cheese eating surrender monkeys oppose Pryor's nomination: Can we all agree that no one in the United States should care what the French, a sorry lot if there ever was one, think about President Bush's judicial nominations? Or, for that matter, the opinion of any European. What a bunch of losers (except for Tony Blair and a few other Brits).

There's only one thing that I hate more than smokers . . . and that's smokers who file frivolous class action lawsuits.

On the lighter side: Who will win Clay or Ruben? I am going to go against the conventional wisdom and pick Clay. But hey, either way a Southerner wins, and that's good enough for me.

Explosion at Yale Law School: Matt Drudge is reporting that an explosion occurred at Yale Law School. Here is the direct link to the article in question.

Please join me in praying that no one was injured.

Princeton's jewel--Cornel West: It is hard to believe that Princeton University, arguably one of the most prestigious universities in the country, employs this buffoon.

"Constitution is not a wish list": The Mobile Register has a well written editorial out today that responds to the NYT's recent editorial expressing the paper's opposition to Bill Pryor's nomination to the Eleventh Circuit. My favorite part of the editorial is the closing paragraph:

But the [New York] Times seems less concerned with what's in the Constitution or in court precedent than it is intent on determining its own sense of what is or isn't fair, and then turning its opinion into a constitutional right -- by judicial fiat, without any democratic processes intervening. Down that road lie not more rights, but tyranny.

Update: Jonathan H. Adler, of NRO, highlighted the Mobile Register editorial on the magazine's blog ("The Corner") today, noting:

DEFENDING PRYOR [Jonathan H. Adler]
Alabama Attorney General Bill Pryor is quickly becoming President Bush's most controversial appellate judicial nominee to date. While Pryor is controversial in D.C., he's appears to a more popular figure in his home state. The latest defense of Pryor is here.
Posted at 05:35 PM

Hey Jonathan, how about linking over to Southern Appeal, which as Howard Bashman recently noted "has been providing the Web's most comprehensive pro-Pryor coverage." Bashman also commented on SA's comprehensive coverage of General Pryor's pending nomination to the Eleventh Circuit here as well. So come on Adler, throw a fellow conservative a bone.

Will Rehnquist and O'Conner step down after this term?: The Atlanta Journal Constitution considers the possibility of such a scenario in this article.

Pryor defends conviction of former Klansman before state appellate court: Here's an interesting Pryor related article that has nothing to do with his pending nomination to the Eleventh Circuit.

Update: You can read more about this case here and here.

Update No. 2: You can access this article from the Mobile Register on Pryor's nomination entitled "Civil rights guardian, outstanding nominee" (via JudicialSelection.org).

Pryor's amicus brief in Lawrence v. Texas: Jonathan Ringel of the Fulton County Daily Report has this article on the subject for Law.com.

Update: Plainsman (of Sub Judice) has posted some extremely thoughtful comments to this particular post, which I highly recommend for your reading pleasure.

Problems with comments: For those of you who posted comments below and are awaiting a response from me (Taint and Mr. P., I am talking to y'all), I am having problems posting comments from my home computer. I will try to get them up ASAP.

The New York Times comes out against Pryor's nomination: Here's the piece for what it's worth. But I honestly don't know why anybody pays attention to anything this disgraced paper has to say.

More on Pryor: Here are two Pryor related articles that those of you following his pending nomination (to the Eleventh Circuit) might find of interest.

The first one is a rehash of an article that I posed about a few days ago re: The National Council of Jewish Women's and the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism's opposition to Pryor's nomination.

"Two Jewish organizations oppose Pryor" (Birmingham News)

When you read this article, pay close attention to the criticism leveled at Pryor.

"We think his nomination endangers the rights of women and all Americans," said Sammie Moshenberg, director of Washington operations for the women's council.

-----A bit over the top, but o.k. I'm game.

Pryor, a 41-year-old Catholic, has been vocally opposed to abortion and has criticized the key Supreme Court decision as "awful" and a ruling that preserved it as one of "the worst examples of judicial activism."

-----Uh, Roe is, arguably, the worst example of judicial activism, and most intellectually honest legal liberals will acknowledge as much.

Supporters say no one should be surprised that President Bush nominated a conservative and that Pryor's hallmark as attorney general has been to follow the rule of law. But Moshenberg said her organization fears he still would find a way to chip away at a woman's right to choose.

----And this fear is justified by?

"Here you have somebody who has gone out of his way not just to express a different viewpoint but has actually taken aim at Roe v. Wade, and for someone to sit on a federal appeals court, it would be very difficult to imagine somebody could count on him to uphold Roe," she said.

-----Uh, Sammie, I've got a news flash for you: General Pryor has no choice but to uphold Roe. You see Sammie, Pryor has been nominated to a circuit court, which is bound to follow the decisions of the Supreme Court. The idea that he would refuse to follow Supreme Court precedent as a federal appellate judge is ridiculous to the point of being laughable. What he will not do is EXPAND Roe and its progeny, and that's what really angers you, eh Sammie?

Another group, NARAL Pro-Choice America, says Pryor answered a survey question last year by saying abortion is murder.

----Abortion is murder?! I am outraged! How dare he say such a thing! General Pryor, don't you know by now that diversity does not include the right to express religious viewpoints (unless of course they're consistent with liberal dogma). You're right NARAL, if someone believes that abortion is murder they have no business being a federal judge. We can't trust those religious kooks to be fair minded, you know.

God, how I loathe the pro-abort groups. They really are the epitome of evil. I despise them with every fiber of my being, especially NARAL.

Finally, here's another article concerning a recent speech Pryor made to an Alabama bar organization:

"Bar Association presents awards" (Mobile Register)

Update: O.k., for some reason my comments software will not let me cut and paste from WordPerfect, so here are my responses to my good friends Taint and Mr. Poon:

Taint-

I agree with you that the judicial activism label is thrown around entirely too much. For example, many people cite the Ninth Circuit's pledge 'o allegiance decision as an example of judicial activism run amok. You and I, however, both know better. Although the Everson decision, which serves as the point 'o origin for the POA case, was a horrendous example of judicial activism (‘Wall of Separation"–what a crock of crap), one can easily argue that the POA decision is perfectly logical under the Court's modern day Establishment Clause jurisprudence. People also cite to the Court's recent states' rights decision as conservative judicial activism, but, as I've explained on Daniel's fine blog recently, that's sheer nonsense.

Roe, on the other hand, is absolutely, unequivocally the quintessential example of judicial arrogance. There is absolutely no support whatsoever in the Constitution for a generalized right to privacy. And even if such a right could arguably be cobbled together from the "penumbras" found in other enumerated rights that offer protection to certain areas of private life, that right would clearly not encompass the right to abortion (unless one buys into the Living Constitution theory, which is really nothing more than a means by which one can simply make up the meaning of the Constitution absent of any neutral or objective principles).

So, my definition of judicial activism is fairly simple: It's when you create a constitutional right out of whole cloth. And before you point to the word "liberty" in the DP Clause of the 14th Amendment, keep in mind that "life, liberty, or property without due process of law" was a common law term of art at the time the Constitution was ratified, and "liberty," in that PROCEDURAL context, simply meant that one could not be physically restrained or detained without some degree of process. Thus, the entire concept of substantive due process is an absolute joke. What about the 9th Amend. or the P&I Clause? Once again, unless you are prepared to buy into the Living Constitution theory, which is entirely bogus, then there is no conceivable basis for finding a constitutional right to abortion.

You are right, however, in noting that unlike some of my conservative brethren, I do not believe that all rights must be specifically enumerated in the Constitution in order to receive constitutional protection. In my view, the Ninth Amendment protects certain individual rights from being violated by the federal government or the states to the extent those rights were commonly recognized at the time the amendment was ratified by a majority of the states in their respective Constitutions. I also believe that other rights are implicitly recognized in the structure of the Constitution (e.g., the right of a state to be immune from being sued in its own courts without its consent--Alden). All of the foregoing, however, can be supported by interpreting the text, history, and structure of the Constitution according to its original meaning. These are defined parameters that can be verified by objective criteria, whereas penumbras are nothing more than a mechanism by which left leaning judges can impose their morality, or lack thereof, upon the rest of us by judicial fiat.

And to answer your last question: Yes, my judge has been called an activist (on at least one time on a case that I worked on). But neither he nor I cared one lick. We were right on the law, so there was no reason to care what some politically motivated lawyer thought about the decision.

Mr P.-

Having spent two years now at the federal appellate level, I can tell you that it would be extremely difficult for Pryor to effect Roe and its progeny in any significant way (i.e., denying a woman's right to an abortion, which is what the pro-aborts claim is at risk every time a conservative is nominated to a circuit court). Once the Supreme Court has handed down its edict from on high that's really the end of the matter. He could concur and express his disdain for the entire line of jurisprudence (as I certainly would), but who cares so long as he abides by the precedent (horrendous as it is). Indeed, to the effect even a small change he would have to get one other judge on the panel to go along with him and then survive en banc and Supreme Court scrutiny. Moreover, as a practical matter, taking direct aim at Roe, after explicitly promising to recognize it before the Senate (which Pryor most certainly will), would harm future judicial conservatives yet to go through the confirmation process, and I am quite sure that’s something Pryor would not want to do. Like me, I strongly suspect that General Pryor is willing to let the matter be resolved at the Supreme Court, where, hopefully, one day Roe will be overruled and swept into the dustbin of history along with Dred Scott and Plessy.

Now, you can bet Pryor would not be for expanding Roe one bit, but I hardly think that disqualifies him from serving as a judge. Indeed, when certain Alabama politicians wanted to thumb their noses at the Supreme Court's decision in Stenberg, Pryor told them in no uncertain terms that the state was required to abide by the decision and that it would do just that. If he recognized the authority of Roe and its progeny as a politician, why would you doubt that he would do so as a judge?

Attention all law geeks!: On May 12, 2003, the Federalist Society and the CATO Institute co-sponsored a forum on the recent Campaign Finance Decision. C-SPAN recorded the event and posted the video on their web site, which you can access here.

Today's Pryor article . . .: comes from Bloomberg News columnist Ann Woolner, which you can access here. The criticism contained is this op-ed in much more clever and subtle than the nonsensical drivel being espoused by most of the usual suspects, but the implication of the piece is that Pryor's nomination to the Eleventh Circuit is somehow unfortunate; when nothing could be farther from the truth. Nevertheless, because this op-ed presents an opposing view of sorts, and because it is fairly well written (sans any great degree of liberal hysteria), I thought some of y'all might find it worth reading.

Bork's new book: Judge Robert H. Bork has a new book coming out next month entitled "Coercing Virtue: The Worldwide Rule of Judges." Here is brief descrption:

Former U.S. solicitor general Robert H. Bork examines the practice of many courts as they consider and decide matters that are not committed to their authority by any legal document. In general, courts have been activist in opposing majority views on such matters as sexual practices, secularism versus religion, rights of speech and expression and feminism. This judicial activism appears to impinge on the legitimate domains of the executive and legislative branches of government and constitutes the judicialization of politics and morals.

According to Bork, a number of courts tend to act in this activist fashion. As well, international tribunals appear to exceed their jurisdiction, posing a threat to national sovereignty just as the national courts threaten democratic government. This activism is more than a threat; Bork argues that both sovereignty and self-government have already been seriously damaged.

Coercing Virtue attempts to account for the phenomenon of why so may courts in democratic nations behave in an imperialistic manner and why the results almost always appear to advance the liberal political and cultural agenda.

If you want to pre-order the book, you can do so here.

Insight into Pryor's judicial philosophy: Here is an excellent presentation that Pryor gave a while back entitled "The Demand for Clarity: Federalism, Statutory Construction, and the 2000 Term" to the American Enterprise Institute. Enjoy.

Bizarre Google Searches: Question: Who in the hell does a Google search for "incest blogs"?

And I am a little more than frightened that my blog is the seventh ranked site for such a query.

Cool tune o' the day: Trust Compnay's "Downfall."

Congrats to my bud Daniel G. ("Trivial Pursuits"): who got a "shout out" from Denise Howell at B&B (a very cool blawg).

Loser of the day, Ellen Goodman: Goodman receives the honor (for the second time I think) for this lovely op ed she wrote for the Boston Globe today entitled "The war over the judiciary."

Pryor's opponents: Two liberal Jewish organizations, the National Council of Jewish Women and the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, are targeting Bill Pryor's nomination for defeat. You can get the details here.

Here's my favorite part of the article:

Moreover, Pryor enjoys considerable popularity at home in Alabama. Even political opponents describe him as fair, professionally capable and committed to the rule of law. Several African-American liberals in the state are backing his nomination, a fact his supporters frequently highlight.

"Pryor really is not the kind of extremist that the other side is trying to make of him," said John Nowacki, legal policy director of the Free Congress Foundation, a conservative advocacy group. "Just like Pickering and Owen, his record is being deliberately misrepresented." He described Pryor as a pragmatic coalition-builder who seeks the middle ground.

"I have a problem with people like Schumer defining the 'mainstream,'" Nowacki said, referring to Democratic Senator Charles Schumer from New York. "Why should anyone accept the definition of a New York liberal, who is far from being objective?" Pryor, he said, is a worthy nominee who faces "knee-jerk" opposition from people unfamiliar with his record.

Update: Here's another article from the same web site linked above re: Pryor's pending nomination to the Eleventh Circuit.

Loser of the day, Joe Conason: Check out this hatchet job.

The tolerance of the left: The leftie law students and professors at the University of Georgia are still bitchin' about Justice Clarence Thomas having been selected as the law school's graduation speaker. What a bunch of idiots. I would have been pleased as punch if ANY Supreme Court justice had spoken at my law school graduation (yes even Souter). So get over it brats, and be thankful that one of the finest jurists to ever grace the Supreme Court saw fit to honor your school with his presence.

"Conn. Supreme Court: Fetus Is Body Part": I pray that one day Americans will look back on things like this and shudder.

Good for you, Mr. Mayor: Washington, D.C., Mayor Anthony Williams is "cautiously voicing support for President Bush's school voucher program, arguing that improvements in the U.S. capital's schools are not happening as quickly or as well as they should." You can access the full article here.

My favorite quote from Mayor Williams in the article:

"The people who are not benefiting [in public schools] are people with the lowest incomes, with the biggest problems and the most severe challenges. And I think it's about time to give them a voice and give them a choice," he said.

Truer words were never spoken.

"Nominees Court Controversy: Bush's judge picks meet resistance": Newsday has this article, which mentions the pending judicial nominations of J. Leon Holmes, Carolyn Kuhl, and this blog's favorite nominee, Bill Pryor.

Update: Here are some other Pryor (or Pryor related) articles that may be of interest to those following his pending nomination:

"The GOP's Judiciary Showdown" (Time)

"Judge (?) William H. Pryor, Jr."(The Anniston Star)

Gods & Generals DVD: The special edition Gods & Generals DVD will be available for purchase on July 15, 2003. Here are some of the features:

* Introduction by Ted Turner.
* Journey to the Past (BET special).
* The Authenticities of the Film.
* The Life of Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson.
* Commentary by director Ron Maxwell; Colonel Keith E. Gibson, Executive Director of the Virginia Military Institute Museum; and James I. Robertson Jr., Alumni Distinguished Professor of History at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.

Note: Viewers can either play all of the scenes that have commentary or play individual scenes with commentary.

* Bob Dylan's "Cross the Green Mountain" music video.
* Mary Fahl's "Going Home" music video.
* Trailer.
* DVD-ROM enabled.
* Feature film available in English and French; subtitles available in English, French and Spanish.

The DVD will be available for $27.98 and the double cassette VHS edition will cost you $22.99.

(Thanks to Sounding the Shallows for the heads up)

"The truth about Pryor is, he's well qualified": Today's edition of the Mobile Register contains the following editorial:

ALMOST EACH week since President George W. Bush nominated Alabama Attorney General Bill Pryor for a seat on the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, leftist groups have thrown a new and scurrilous kind of character assassination at Mr. Pryor.

Differing opinions are one thing, but when opponents resort to cheap shots and rank inaccuracies, the facts demand to be laid bare.

The latest attack was led last week by Martin Luther King III, who ignored wide black support for Mr. Pryor within Alabama to make a ludicrous charge that the AG "cannot comprehend the continuing need for voting rights protections for African-Americans in the Deep South, and is unlikely to fairly evaluate and firmly enforce the provisions of the Voting Rights Act in cases that come before him."

That's hogwash. As was noted in yesterday's Register Insight section by former assistant U.S. Attorney Willie Huntley, a Mobile African-American, Mr. Pryor has actually defended black interests, under the Voting Rights Act, against attack from plaintiffs of Mr. Pryor's own Republican Party.

Mr. Pryor has complained of just one section of the act that requires "pre-clearance" from Justice Department bureaucrats for voting changes as minor as moving polling places from one street corner to the next.

Far from being extreme, Mr. Pryor's position is in line with the official stance taken by Georgia Attorney General Thurbert Baker, a black Democrat, in a case now pending before the U.S. Supreme Court. Mr. Baker wrote in his brief that the pre-clearance provision is "a grave intrusion into the authority of the states."

News reports also consistently mischaracterize Mr. Pryor as having "compared" or "equated" homosexual sex with bestiality and incest. He did neither.

What he has written is that extending the limited right to privacy now recognized in the Constitution to cover all private consensual acts in the home, as is effectively requested by plaintiffs seeking to overthrow a Texas anti-sodomy statute, could have the effect of providing a constitutional right for other sexual practices such as "prostitution ... bestiality ... and even incest."

Mr. Pryor's position is nothing more than the current law of the land, as explained in a still-standing 1986 Supreme Court precedent that specifically included "incest" as one of the acts that would be decriminalized if such a bogus constitutional right were invented by judicial fiat.

In fact, one of the liberal stalwarts of the current Supreme Court, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, made the same argument back in 1977, writing that "prostitution as a consensual act between adults is arguably within the zone of privacy protected by recent constitutional decisions."

Similarly, liberal activists have targeted Mr. Pryor for opposing the federal Violence Against Women Act. But all he did was argue against one small provision that puts the act of rape under the legal category of -- amazingly -- interstate commerce. Again, the Supreme Court upheld Mr. Pryor's position. And his record in protecting women from violence is so strong that Penelope House, a battered women's shelter, has honored him in its Hall of Fame.

Bill Pryor is a principled public servant with an impressive resumé and a brilliant legal mind. The false attacks ought to be ignored, and he should be confirmed to the federal bench.

Pryor profile on NPR: You can access the profile here.

Light posting for the next few days: I am in the process of preparing for my next sitting with the judge folks, so posting here at SA may be a tad on the light side for two or three days. In the meantime, please check out some of the excellent blogs listed below, or feel free to use the comments sections for the posts below to debate away. I should be back in the swing of things on Thursday.

The latest Southern Appeal "belle" is . . .: "Detache," a "sessy chick" maintaining a "blog of your average complex introverted sarcastic twenty-something ex-violinist asian conservative sorority girl with a southern accent."

That may be the coolest blog description ever.

"Two filibusters is enough": That's what Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) is quoted as having said in this article after the SJC voted 10-9 to send Carolyn Kuhl's nomination (to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals) to the Senate floor for further consideration. I am not sure how much to read into this statement, but it would appear to be an encouraging sign that at least some dems are starting to consider the long term implications of filibustering every one of Bush's conservative judicial nominees (link via How Appealing).

Heldman's take on Bill Pryor's press release: Sam has a post today questioning the candor of the press release issued by Bill Pryor yesterday defending his record on civil rights, which I will quote in full:

Bill Pryor on Bill Pryor

So Alabama AG Bill Pryor, nominated to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, has issued a press release responding to those who have attacked his stance on the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Here are two quotes. The first is from his press release:

I believe the Voting Rights Act is one of the greatest and most necessary laws in American history. I have expressed some concern that Congress should consider minor changes to that vital law to end procedural and political abuses that do not affect minority voters and were never intended by Congress.

Now here is a quote from Bill Pryor's testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee, in 1997. After discussing some litigation under the Voting Rights Act -- including a case in which I participated, which was an effort to increase the opportunity of Black voters to elect candidates of their choice to Alabama's appellate courts, and other cases that involved expansion of local governing bodies so that Black voters would be able to elect a candidate of their choosing to multi-member boards -- Pryor called these rulings a "dramatic" and "intrusive abuse of judicial power", and further said to the Senate:

I encourage you to consider seriously, for example, the repeal or amendment of section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, which is an affront to federalism and an expensive burden that has far outlived its usefulness, and consider modifying other provisions of the Act that have led to extraordinary abuses of judicial power.

Pryor's Senate testimony was not -- despite the apparent assertion in his press release -- talking about "procedural and political abuses that do not affect minority voters"; instead he was talking about judicial decrees that were designed to improve the strength of minority voters but that Pryor felt had gone too far or otherwise erred. And he was not -- despite the apparent assertion in his press release -- talking about "minor changes". He was instead expressly talking about repeal of Section 5 itself, along with other changes to the law. The repeal of Section 5, as anyone familiar with the Act could tell you, would be no "minor change"; Section 5 is one of the major provisions of the law, with a focus and effect different from the other provisions of the law. And he was not -- despite the implication in his press release -- talking about simply putting things back to the way that Congress had "intended"; instead, his attack on Section 5 was expressly based on a vision of "federalism," though no such "federalism" had been any part of Congress's intent in enacting Section 5 in the first place.

The best thing that Bill Pryor has going for his nomination, I think, is his reputation for candor. But if this press release is any indication, he may be voluntarily giving up that one advantage.

posted by sam 1:16 PM

O.k., now time does not permit me to respond to this post in any great detail; but I will make a couple of quick points. However, before you consider the merits of my views or Sam's view, let's take a quick gander at the Department of Justice's summary of the purpose/function of Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act:

U.S. Department of Justice
Civil Rights Division
Voting Section

About Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act:

Section 5, one of the original provisions of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, is codified at 42 U.S.C. 1973c. In 1970, 1975 and 1982, Congress readopted and broadened the coverage of Section 5, based upon a continued need for preclearance of new voting procedures. Although the voting protections of the Fifteenth Amendment and Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act are permanent, Section 5 remains in effect through 2007.

Under Section 5, any change with respect to voting in a covered jurisdiction -- or any political subunit within it -- cannot legally be enforced unless and until the jurisdiction first obtains preclearance. Section 5 provides that preclearance may be obtained only from the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, or from the United States Attorney General. Preclearance requires proof that the proposed voting change does not deny or abridge the right to vote on account of race, color, or membership in a language minority group. If the jurisdiction is unable to prove the absence of such discrimination, the District Court denies preclearance, or in the case of administrative submissions, the Attorney General objects to the change, and it remains legally unenforceable.

The Voting Section is responsible for reviewing voting changes submitted to the Attorney General (15,000 to 24,000 changes each year) and for defending Section 5 litigation in court. The Voting Section also brings lawsuits to enjoin the enforcement of voting changes that have not received the required Section 5 preclearance.Counts of Voting Changes by Type and by Year.

Section 5 freezes changes in election practices or procedures in certain states until the new procedures have been "precleared", either after administrative review by the United States Attorney General, or after a lawsuit before the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. This means that voting changes in covered jurisdictions may not be used until Section 5 preclearance has been obtained.

Section 5 preclearance will be denied if the proposed change has not been shown to be free of the purpose and the effect of discriminating on the basis of race or membership in a language minority group. Almost all voting changes are submitted to the Attorney General, and over the past decade the Attorney General has received submissions of between 14,000 and 22,000