The more I think about it, the more I think there’s something inherently corrupt about the “she’s a reliable vote” argument. I’m not singling any reader, blogger or activist out because this argument tends to reside amidst a lot of other arguments and other rhetoric. At its core, the “reliable vote” argument suggests that that’s all that matters — a conservative vote. Without casting aspersions on others, that’s not good enough for me (and it may be grotesquely unfair to Miers). If all that’s required is a reliable vote, National Review and the Heritage Foundation have plenty of interns who will do just fine. As George Will writes this morning, Bush’s pick of Miers smacks of identity politics (a point several of us have made around here) and how it suggests that Bush sees the Court as a representative body. The reliable vote argument is imbedded in this view of the court. It says that arguments and due dilligence don’t matter. What matters is that “our side” gets its voice on the Court, period.
This sounds to me a bit like the “results-oriented conservatism” some on the web are touting in Miers’ defense. Who needs all that pointy-headed intellectual stuff if at the end of the day she votes the same way? (I assume some of these people defended Clarence Thomas against the charge that he’s Scalia’s sidekick. But why bother if the vote is all that matters?) Conservatives, I thought, were supposed to believe ideas have consequences, that American institutions — chief among them the Supreme Court and the Constitution — have specific and organic roles to play in the culture which depend on intellectual honesty, opposition to cant, and a dispassionate rejection of the politicization of the law. The reliable vote argument — absent other rationales — runs counter to all of these. This becomes obvious when you imagine a Democratic President appointing a confidante with few obvious credentials for the Supreme Court. A president Kerry could hardly convince any of us that his pick should be confirmed because she’s a reliable vote.
This is not to say I am against reliable votes on the court, but the reason why they are reliable is to me vitally important. Scalia and Thomas are fairly reliable votes because they have a grounding in philosophy and an intellectual consistency that even their greatest critics respect (at least in the case of Scalia; Thomas still gets unfair treatment). Miers may have these qualities too. There’s simply little to no evidence that she does at this point. I for one hope she reveals herself as a grander intellect than her detracters claim she is. I hope she reveals herself to be more than a reliable vote.