Among the members of the "Justice Advisory Committee" that the Giuliani presidential campaign announced today are four lawyers who have been mentioned in media reports as possible Supreme Court nominees at various times since the Bush administration first came to power.
The committee's chairman, former U.S. solicitor general Theodore Olson, was mentioned as a possible nominee to replace retiring justice Sandra Day O'Connor and later the withdrawn Court nominee Harriet Miers. Olson, a friend and adviser to Giuliani since the two met in 1981 while working in the Reagan Justice Department, says the committee of 19 lawyers, former government officials, and law professors will advise Giuliani on legal issues on whatever subject hizzoner wishes. Committee members will also serve as campaign surrogates, Olson says, writing and speaking on Giuliani's behalf.
The Giuliani campaign is likely to emphasize in particular the participation of former assistant to the solicitor general Miguel Estrada, former deputy attorney general Larry Thompson, and former deputy solicitor general Maureen Mahoney. All three have been mentioned as potential nominees to the Supreme Court during Bush's administration. Their names will likely resurface when the next Court vacancy occurs--something that will almost certainly happen during the next president's first term, if not before. Committee member Steven G. Calabresi, a cofounder of the Federalist Society and professor at Northwestern University, said at a press conference Tuesday that the next president may nominate up to four justices to the Court.
Estrada, a Honduran immigrant and graduate of Columbia and Harvard, is now in private practice. He was the subject of fierce political controversy in 2001 and 2002 when President Bush nominated him to a seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, known as a stepping stone to the Supreme Court. Democrats mounted a successful filibuster to block Estrada's nomination. But Estrada is young, and likely to resurface in public life.
Thompson, the former deputy attorney general, is now general counsel at PepsiCo. The well regarded lawyer's views on constitutional issues are relatively unknown. If nominated and confirmed to the Court, Thompson would be the third African-American justice in U.S. history.
Former Deputy Solicitor General Maureen Mahoney, also in private practice, is a former clerk to the late Chief Justice William Rehnquist. She has been called the "female John Roberts" because of her successful record arguing cases before the high Court. But conservatives may view one of those successes as potential liability--Mahoney argued successfully on behalf of the University of Michigan Law School in the 2003 case Grutter v. Bollinger, in which the Court ruled that the law school's use of race in admissions was constitutional because other factors contributing to student "diversity" were also considered.
Expect the number of lawyers included in the Justice Advisory Committee to grow. "We're absolutely going to expand," says Olson. And a lawyer's inclusion in the committee may increase their job prospects down the road, Olson adds. For Giuliani, "these are the kind of people who he will probably recruit for his administration."
