November 04, 2005

Mainstream Alito

Another prestigious legal scholar supports the Alito nomination. John Lott backs up his conclusion that Alito is no extremist with the results of an independent study:

"Law professors Stephen Choi of New York University and Mitu Gulati of Georgetown University did a study of the circuit court judges appointed from the administration of presidents Jimmy Carter through the first term of Bill Clinton on several issues. Among them was whether a judge votes in lockstep with other judges nominated by the same political party. They found that Alito was the 12th-most politically independent Republican of the 55 that they studied. If he had been a Democrat, his ranking would have made him the eighth- most politically independent out of 42."(emphasis added)