CNN/Time: Some clues to Miers' views

[highplainsdem]

http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/10/10/miers.views.tm/


Some clues to Miers' views
By JYOTI THOTTAM

Monday, October 10, 2005; Posted: 12:09 p.m. EDT (16:09 GMT)

With an even thinner paper trail than John Roberts', Harriet Miers has left both supporters and opponents guessing.

To gauge her thinking on key legal issues, they are combing through everything from old bar-association newsletters to interviews with her fellow churchgoers. Here's a look at the scant evidence so far:

•ABORTION

While president of the Texas Bar Association, Miers joined a debate in the early 1990s within the American Bar Association over whether the A.B.A. should take a stand on abortion. The group had gone from neutral to pro-choice and back again. Miers, joined by other Southern state bar associations, pushed the A.B.A. to remain neutral, but she never stated her underlying position on abortion.

<snip>

•CRIME AND PUNISHMENT

The vast majority of Miers' corporate cases were resolved without litigation, so she has rarely seen the inside of a courtroom. She has expressed strong opinions, though, about the justice system, advocating the expansion of free legal aid and encouraging lawyers to do more pro bono work. In a 1993 A.B.A. Journal article, she called for more funding for the defense of death-row prisoners in Texas. Miers also served on the board of Exodus Ministries, a Christian group that helps former prisoners adjust to life outside prison.

<snip>


It's her views on crime and punishment that I found most interesting here. Her views on legal aid, pro bono work, and increased funding for the defense of death-row prisoners in Texas are more liberal than I'd expected.

[shoelace414]

1. she was a democrat before she flipped.

then again.. so was Reagan

[Neil Lisst]

2. Actually, she was never a Dem, but a go-along

Miers was never a Dem. She was a person who did what was best for her career, always. She has had an adult life of absolute servitude to the robber barons of our time.

When power shifted, so did she.

I don't think she stands for anything except BEING THERE.

[tridim]

3. What does Tina Yothers have to do with this?

Or is that just your sig line?

[shoelace414]

4. it's my sig

like it? :)