Heidi Li's Potpourri

Congratulations, Judge Christen, on your appointment to Alaska's Supreme Court

(Left, Judge Morgen Christen.)

Yesterday, Governor Sarah Palin announced the appointment of Anchorage Superior Court Judge Morgan Christen to the high court in Alaska. Judge Christen will be just the second woman named to the high court in the 50 years since statehood. Some will emphasize the Sarah Palin angle of this story, because of differences between Christen's social values and Palin's. But to me, that is not the big part of the story. The big part of the story is that even in a state with a relatively small population, there was a woman jurist about whom any Governor, regardless of her or his own ideology, could say would make an outstanding state Supreme Court judge.

"Alaska's Supreme Court bears the awesome responsibility of ensuring that our court system administers justice in firm accordance with the principles laid down in our state Constitution," Palin said in a written statement. "I have every confidence that Judge Christen has the experience, intellect, wisdom and character to be an outstanding Supreme Court justice." (emphases mine)

Alaska, like most states, has a procedure by which it produces a set of candidates from whom the Governor may select a high court judge - in other words, there are are checks on the Governor's choices. Under the state Constitution, Palin had to select from among the nominees sent to her by the seven-member Alaska Judicial Council. To get on the map of such a  Council a judge has to have demonstrated professional excellence and, usually, shown involvement in the community more generally.

Judge Christen fits that bill based on the public write-ups I could find readily. This one comes from an Alaskan philanthropic foundation whose board she sits, the Rasmuson Foundation:

Judge Morgan Christen was appointed to the superior court in Anchorage in 2001. In 2005, she was appointed Presiding Judge for the Third Judicial District. Judge Christen currently co-chairs both the Child in Need of Aid Committee and the Probate Rules Subcommittee for Involuntary Mental Health Commitments. She serves as a member of the Board of Directors for the Rasmuson Foundation and the Alaska Community Foundation.

Prior to being appointed to the bench, Judge Christen was a litigation partner at the law firm of Preston, Gates & Ellis from 1992-2001. She worked as an associate attorney at Preston from 1987-1992. Judge Christen clerked for the Honorable Brian Shortell after she graduated from the Golden Gate University School of Law and received her undergraduate degree in international studies from the University of Washington.

Judge Christen's previous professional experience includes service as a Lawyer Representative for the Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference, service on the Alaska Bar Association Disciplinary Committee and as President of the Anchorage Association of Women Lawyers. Judge Christen has been a member of the Anchorage Rotary Club since 1994 and is a former member of the Board of Directors for Big Brothers Big Sisters of Alaska. In 2004, Judge Christen, was awarded the Light of Hope award for work on behalf of Alaska's children, and the Chamber of Commerce Athena Society Award. In 2004, Judge Christen and her husband, Jim Torgerson, received the Outstanding Philanthropist of the Year award from the Association of Fundraising Professionals Alaska Chapter. Her special interests include family, hiking, traveling in Alaska, reading and cooking.

While this bio demonstrates that Judge Christen has been active and involved in both the judiciary and broader Alaskan civic activities, what I, as a lawyer and law professor, find most striking about it is, in some respects, its essential ordinariness in terms of the credentials one would expect a state high court appointee to have. This in no way detracts from Judge Christen, who has clearly worked hard to extend her reach outside the four walls of courtroom, both to influence and to learn about her state and its different demographic sectors. This is exactly what we should want from jurists - people with competence in the courtroom in and interest in goings-on outside of it. So I applaud Judge Christen's decisions to get to know both the Rotary Club AND the Anchorage Association of American Lawyers; to have worked on behalf of children and on behalf of Alaska's business community. She will be deciding cases involving interests related to all kinds of Alaskans and this brief biographical sketch indicates that she's taken the time to get to know a cross-section of the citizenry.

Now it happens that Judge Christen, in the 1990s,  was on the board of Planned Parenthood. And a conservative Christian group, the Alaska Family Council, decided to apply pressure to Governor Palin to get her not to appoint Judge Christen to the Supreme Court. This is what the Alaska Daily News seems to find most noteworthy, or at least most newsworthy, about Judge Christen's appoint. (The paper's headline: Palin bucks pressure in Supreme Court appointment;  Selection went against push from Alaska Family Council.)

But the real news here is that a sitting Governor simply picked an apparently competent jurist with a range of ties to the state's community and that the Governor and the judge are both women, and both women are in the positions they are in by virtue of fairly ordinary career paths, career paths that have, however, led each to some fairly extraordinary positions.

Cross-posted at Heidi Li on Equality at 51 Percent.

Secretary of State Clinton reaches out to women in Seoul, Korea

Main information crossposted from 51 Percent.

"I think that it’s imperative that nations like ours stand up for the rights of women. It is not ancillary to our progress; it is central." - Hillary Rodham Clinton speakng in Seoul, 2/20/2009

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton is doing as many of us expected, using her position to reach out to and therefore empower women around the world. One way women here at home can begin to overcome their differences to work together toward women's emancipation is to understand what we share in common with women around the world, so that we can all work toward women's emancipation. Below is the text of Secretary Clinton's primary remarks, my emphases added.

Women's Empowerment Is Key To Progress

Hillary Rodham Clinton

Secretary of State

Town Hall Meeting at Ewha Women's University

Seoul, South Korea

February 20, 2009

SECRETARY CLINTON: Good afternoon. (cheers and applause) Thank you so much, President Lee. I am honored to be here at this great university. I wish to thank also Chairperson (inaudible) and the more than 107,000 alumni at this great school. Standing up with me was our Ambassador Kathy Stephens, who has told me that more than 50 graduates of Ewha Womans University work at U.S. Embassy Seoul. We are extremely proud of the education they have received here.

It is a great privilege to stand here before you on the stage of the largest women’s university in the world. And I came to – (applause) – this university as a matter of destiny, because you see, Ewha and I share a connection. (Cheers and applause.) I am a Methodist, my family on my father’s side comes from Scranton, Pennsylvania – (applause) – and I must say that Wellesley College is a sister college for Ewha University. (Applause.) So being an honorary fellow seems right at home today.

I also note that in this audience are some Korean-American friends from New York and California. There are several Wellesley graduates whom I met backstage as well – (applause) – and an extraordinary number of talented young women, faculty members, and administrators.

Learning about this great university and the role that you have played in advancing the status of women made me think about so many of the women throughout history who are inspirations to me: Madame Scranton, someone who started teaching one young woman, and from her dedication and hard work came this university; Eleanor Roosevelt, a pioneering First Lady of the United States and a voice for democracy around the world, and one of the driving forces behind the United Nations Declaration on Human Rights. Now, that was more than 50 years ago, but just a few weeks ago, one of Korea’s most accomplished leaders, United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, called on all nations worldwide to push for more progress on women’s equality. And I want to thank the Secretary General – (applause) – because he said that women’s empowerment is the key to progress in developing nations.

People who think hard about our future come to the same conclusion, that women and others on society’s margins must be afforded the right to fully participate in society, not only because it is morally right, but because it is necessary to strengthen our security and prosperity.

Before I came out on stage, I met a number of young women who are in political office here in the Republic of  Korea, and I hope I was looking at a future president of this great nation. (Applause.)

As you think about your own futures, keeping in mind security and prosperity and the role that each of us must play, is essential because of the urgent global challenges we face in the 21st century. We need all of our people’s talents to be on the very forefront of setting a course of peace, progress, and prosperity; be it defending our nations from the threat of nuclear proliferation and terror, or resolving the global climate crisis or the current economic crisis, and promoting civil society, especially women’s rights and education, healthcare, clean energy, good governance, the rule of law, and free and fair elections. All of these matters speak to our common desire to make a nation that is safe and strong and secure.

More than half a century ago, this university became the first to prepare women for professions that were formerly reserved for men, including medicine, law, science, and journalism. At about the same time, your government wrote women’s equality into your constitution and guaranteed protections for women in employment. And there have been other rights and protections for women encoded in Korean law in subsequent decades.

These advances coincided with Korea’s transformation from an undeveloped nation to a dynamic democracy, a global economic power, and a hub of technology and innovation. The inclusion of women in the political and economic equation, calling on those talents and contributions from the entire population, not just the male half, was essential to the progress that this country has made.

As I have been on this first trip as Secretary of State, I have visited Japan and Indonesia, and tomorrow I will be in China. I was very impressed by my visit to Indonesia, a young democracy that is demonstrating to the world that democracy, Islam, modernity, and women’s rights can coexist. I met elected women officials. I met high appointed members in the foreign ministry and other cabinet positions in the government. It would be hard to imagine the progress that Indonesia has made in the last ten years, moving from a stagnant autocracy to a burgeoning democracy, without women being part of the reason.

And on Sunday, I’ll meet with women in China to hear about their efforts to improve opportunities for themselves in their own country, another reason why women have to lead the way if there’s going to be higher standards of living, a healthier population, and an actively engaged citizenry.

But no country has yet achieved full equality for women. We still have work to do, don’t we? And just a few weeks ago, President Obama signed into law a new provision protecting women from salary discrimination, a step that was overdue. So there is a lot ahead of us to ensure that gender equality, as President Lee mentioned, becomes a reality. And we also need to remain vigilant against a backlash that tries to turn the clock back on women and human rights, countries where leaders are threatened by the idea of freedom and democracy and women are made the scapegoats. The abuses of women under the Taliban are horrific reminders that just as women had been central to progress in countries like ours, the reverse can happen as well.

Some of you may have seen the news reports some weeks ago of young girls in Afghanistan who were so eager to go to school, and every day they went off with a real light in their eyes because they were finally able to learn.
And one day, a group of these young girls were assaulted by a group of Taliban men who threw acid on them because they had the desire to learn. We have to remain vigilant on behalf of women’s rights.

We see this kind of suppression in different forms in different places. In Burma, the valor of Aung San Suu Kyi, who won the Nobel Peace Prize for her courageous struggle for freedom of expression and conscience. To the North, 70 percent of those leaving North Korea in search of a better life are women, a sad commentary on the conditions in their own country.

So part of my message during this trip and part of my mission as Secretary of State is that the United States is committed to advancing the rights of women to lead more equitable, prosperous lives in safe societies. I view this not only as a moral issue, but as a security issue. I think that it’s imperative that nations like ours stand up for the rights of women. It is not ancillary to our progress; it is central.

In 1995, when I went to the United Nations Conference on Women in Beijing and said that women’s rights were human rights, and human rights were women’s rights, people were so excited. But that to me was almost a sad commentary that we had to say something so obvious toward the end of the [twentieth] century.

So here we are in the [twenty-first] century, and every day we make progress, but we can’t be complacent. We have to highlight the importance of inclusion for women. We have to make clear that no democracy can exist without women’s full participation; no economy can be truly a free market without women involved.

I want to use robust diplomacy and development to strengthen our partnerships with other governments and create collaborative networks of people and nongovernmental organizations to find innovative solutions to global problems – what we call smart power.

Today, I’ve come to this great women’s university to hear your thoughts about the future. The other night in Tokyo, I had the privilege to listen to students at Tokyo University, and I came away not only impressed by their intelligence and the quality of their questions, but encouraged by their concern about the future that lay ahead and what each of them wanted to do to make it better.

Today, I’ve held bilateral meetings with your president, your prime minister, and your foreign minister. We have discussed issues like the need to continue the Six-Party Talks to bring about the complete and verifiable denuclearization in North Korea, and how we can better coordinate not only between ourselves, but regionally and globally, on the range of issues that confront us. But in each meeting, we took time to reflect about how far this country has come.

Back in the early 1960s, there were a series of studies done where different groups were looking at nations around the world, trying to calculate which ones would be successful at the end of the 20th century. And many commentators and analysts thought that the chances for the Republic of Korea were limited. But that wasn’t the opinion of the people of Korea. And so for 50 years, you have built a nation that is now assuming a place of leadership in the world, respected for the vibrant democracy, for the advances across the board in every walk of life. And it is a tribute to your understanding of what it takes to make progress at a time of peril and uncertainty.

The relationship between the United States and Korea is deep and enduring, and it is indispensible to our shared security. Without security, children can’t even imagine their futures and may not have the potential to actually live up to their talents. Our two countries have joined together as a force for peace, prosperity, and progress. Korean and American soldiers have served shoulder-to-shoulder in so many places around the world.
We know that the most acute challenge to stability and security in Northeast Asia is the regime in North Korea, and particularly its nuclear program. It bears repeating that President Obama and I are committed to working through the Six-Party Talks. We believe we have an opportunity to move those forward and that it is incumbent upon North Korea to avoid provocative actions and unhelpful rhetoric toward the people and the leaders of the Republic of Korea. Remember that the North Korean Government committed to abandoning all nuclear weapons and returning at an early date to the Treaty of Nonproliferation of Nuclear Weapons.

And I make the offer again right here in Seoul: If North Korea is genuinely prepared to completely and verifiably eliminate their nuclear weapons program, the Obama Administration will be willing to normalize bilateral relations, replace the peninsula’s longstanding armistice agreement with a permanent peace treaty, and assist in meeting the energy and other economic and humanitarian needs of the Korean people.

Also essential to our shared security and prosperity is a resolution to the global economic crisis. Korea and the United States have both benefited from a strong economic relationship, and your leaders and I today discussed ways we can develop that relationship further. We are going to work on a vision of a much more comprehensive strategic relationship. We want more partnerships to bring not just government leaders together, but business and professional and academic and political and people-to-people. We want to work with Korea so that both of us will be leaders in getting at the root causes of global climate change and vigorously pursuing a clean energy agenda. And I applaud your country for being a global leader in this area, and for calling on the ingenuity and skills of the Korean people to promote green technologies that will create jobs and protect our planet and enhance our security.

Students here at Ewha have a long and proud tradition of engagement with the world. And you have the talent and the training to help shape that world. It may not be always obvious what you can do to make a difference, so do what you love. Do what gives you meaning. Do what makes life purposeful for you. And make a contribution.

I don’t know that Mary Scranton, who founded this university teaching one student in her home, could have ever dreamed of where we would be today. But that’s often the way life is. I never could have dreamed that I could be here as the Secretary of State of the United States either. (Applause.) You have to be willing to prepare yourselves and as you are doing to take advantage of the opportunities that arise, to find cooperative ways to work with others to promote the common good, and then follow your dreams. You may not end up exactly where you started out heading toward, but with your education and with the opportunities now available in your country, there is so much that you can do. And I know that you will be well-equipped to make your contribution that will contribute to the peace and prosperity and progress and security, not only of Korea, but of the region and the world that needs and is waiting for your talents.
Thank you all and God bless you. (Applause.)
And now we’re going to have some questions, I think, right? (Laughter.)

[Secretary Clinton's meeting continued]

For a friend: What it is like to be a liberal law professor in Washington, DC in February 2009

Dear friend,
You asked whether I was finding it easier to be a liberal who was not enthusiastic about President Obama's candidacy and is not enthusiastic about his administration. The short answer: no. The problem is both due to external circumstances and internal ones. I've never been a left-leaner who takes pride in being left of the mainstream Democratic establishment. But this year, as the race narrowed down to Clinton and Obama, it was clear to me to that the more liberal candidate was Clinton: the candidate more interested in a politics favoring the middle-class, especially the lower middle class, and the poor; the candidate more interested in separation between church and state; the candidate more interested in gay rights and women's rights and economic justice. The candidate who understood that Kumbaya is not popular song in Washington, D.C. and for good reason: politics is not nonpartisan: it is fight, rooted in competing visions of social good and the means to achieve it.

I work at a place of higher education where it was unfashionable to support Clinton's candidacy, on the widely broadcast assumption that no liberal could prefer any other candidate to a viable black Democratic candidate. There were some underlying messages broadcast along with this: that it was "cool" to support a relatively young black man who liked sports while it was "shrill" to support a slightly older white woman who liked her daughter and her friends. Indeed as time went on, the misogyny of the academy, which is a topic for another time, became more and more apparent.

I started this blog with the intention of giving those friends and family interested in the volunteering I did for then-Senator Clinton's campaign a way of opting in to updates. I told almost nobody at work about the blog or the extent of the blogging because it was so obviously assumed by every colleague around me (except for those encountered at Clinton events, where we greeted each other with happy surprise) that we must all be on the same side and that meant the Obama side. Work is enough of a stressful environment (that's why it is called work, after all) that I did not have the interest or the energy to forcefully object to this blind assumption.

I did occasionally express my frustrations with the DNC and the way it rigged its convention, its refusal to follow its own rules. This usually provoked hostility. I think some of that hostility had to do with the fact that, since I am a member of law school faculty, the criticism hit home: law professors - full fledged ones - tend to take pride in due and fair process. To be reminded that the Democratic Party had engaged in the same sort of hijinks that so offended my colleagues when performed by the Republican Party did not make people happy.

Part of my coping strategy was to put my head and heart into my teaching and scholarship and try to tune out the political noise, which was very loud. The line between work and politics at a "liberal" law school in Washington D.C. is very thin. The strategy has been effective for my teaching and scholarship. But just as so many people feel irreparable rifts with friends who could not accept that they would not support Senator Obama, I feel a rift - I don't know if it will be irreparable - with an institution that felt so comfortable silencing anybody who supported Senator Clinton.

Coming up is our faculty retreat. Part of its theme is "reflections on the presidential election." I will have a better idea of how things are after this event, because I will see if I can talk about the misogyny during the election and the centrism (even economic and social right tilt) of the current Democratic administration without getting the same blowback that went on prior to the general election. Maybe it will be easier for people to hear about these concerns now that a Democrat is safely ensconced in the White House. They, like me, were so ready for an end to the Bush years, and maybe any questioning of whether the ends justified the means or even whether the the means were regrettable was too scary or painful or threatening before President Obama actually won. I confess I am nervous about voicing my views at the retreat. Yet if I do not, then I am not being fair to my colleagues who may not realize just how antagonistic they seemed to any Democrat who did not share their faith in party and candidate Obama.

U.S. Department of Labor -- Women's Bureau: Kim Gandy is no Mary Anderson

I have been given to understand that a) Kim Gandy, currently President of N.O.W. (National Organization for Women) wants to become head of the Women's Bureau at the Department of Labor and that b) today, February 8, 2009, a number of bloggers will be discussing whether appointing her to the job is a good idea. That Ms. Gandy wants the job is a total rumor to me; if she does, I can't say that the choice thrills me.

The choice of Gandy does not thrill me because she holds great power at N.O.W. (from the N.O.W. site: "Gandy also is president of the NOW Foundation, chair of NOW's Political Action Committees, and serves as the principal spokesperson for all three entities"; and I think she used that power to have N.O.W. sell women down the river when N.O.W. broke with its usual practice and made a general election presidential endorsement, picking Barack Obama, somebody who used and tolerated sexism and misogyny to gain the Democratic Party's nomination. I use the expression "sold women down the river" with all its metaphorical baggage: the image of humans being treated like chattel sold down to the Delta to be auctioned off. I think N.O.W. had very little evidence of Barack Obama's commitment to women's empowerment, little evidence of even his commitment to women's reproductive rights (the usual excuse used by mainstream women's groups to go out of their way to support his candidacy). And still, under the leadership of Gandy, N.O.W. went out of its way to auction off women's votes, encouraging them to turn out and make sure this man, who never once denounced the nutcrackers and the media comments and the misogynistic rappers singing him into office, became President of the United States of America.

On the other side of the ledger, Kim Gandy has clearly spent the better part of her life working on issues important to women; she's probably quite knowledgeable about working conditions for women and in a position to hire high quality staff. So Gandy is not a bad person and she's not anti-woman. But she made a Faustian bargain at high profile moment. The dynamics of the general election were such that women's votes really mattered. And lots of women were and still are furious at the Democratic Party for depriving Hillary Rodham Clinton of an equal opportunity to win the nomination at the Denver Convention by abiding by the Party's own rules and traditions. Under these circumstances, N.O.W. should have remained agnostic. As an organization that does not usually trade in presidential endorsements, refraining from making one would not have made news. Going out of its way to endorse Obama is what made news, and Gandy made that decision. In a year when every poll showed any generic Democrat beating John McCain and almost every poll consistently predicted Obama beating McCain, there really was no reason - even for those who believed that McCain would be a worse president for women than Obama - for women's organizations to line up behind Obama. The only reason to do so would be fear of reprisal if they did not; or if their leaders hoped for a seat within the administration after the election. N.O.W. and, if rumor is correct, Ms. Gandy acted for the latter reasons.

I believe that once a person shows a capacity for major betrayal - in public or private life - that person cannot be safely relied upon to act in a reasonably trustworthy way again. So I was not surprised that it turned out that Bill Richardson had apparently not been totally forthcoming with the Obama administration about the corruption charges against him back in New Mexico. If Richardson would deceive the Clintons to further his aims, why would he not do the same to Obama?

If Kim Gandy was willing to sell out women who expected really very little of her - just that she stick with usual practice and show organizational restraint in an election that was wracking many women with distress - I can easily predict that she will sell out women who expect harder things of her, such as real fighting for women's interests in an economy that is bad for everybody but worst for women.

That said, making a deal with the devil does not make Kim Gandy the devil. Of course neither does it make her another Mary Anderson, the first director of the Women's Bureau of the Department of Labor.

Mary Anderson (served 1920 - 1944)

The first "up from the ranks" labor woman to head an executive department of the Federal Government, Mary Anderson directed the Women's Bureau for nearly 25 years, leading efforts to win better wages, hours and working condition for women. She served for five presidents and, during her tenure, saw the ranks of women workers more than double.

- Women's Bureau, Director's Gallery

 

"As the world evolves, so too does the growing role of women who are proving their infinite capabilities in today's complex workplace, and exhibiting a new usefulness now and for the future."

from the Labor Hall of Fame citation inducting Mary Anderson

Also from that citation:

From a domestic worker to factory employee to trade union leader, Swedish-born Mary Anderson was a tireless champion of women in the workplace. Director of the Women's Bureau for a quarter century, she was the most influential of all women in Federal service. Her leadership in fact-finding and standards-setting established her as the Nation's foremost authority in the struggle for women's rights and the improvement of their lives and working conditions.

At the start of the 20th century the Women's Bureau was headed by a woman whose commitment to women's equal opportunity in the workplace transcended party politics. Why should we expect anything less from the Director appointed at the start of the 21st century?

(Excerpted at 51 Percent)

If Iceland can accept a gay woman as head of state, why does that seem so unimaginable for the United States?

Time for another thought experiment (admittedly, one not far removed from recent and present realities). Imagine if the United States were facing an unprecedented financial-social crisis, the makings of which had been brewing for years and the solutions to which were far from obvious. Suppose the mood of the country favored genuine unity. Genuine unity, of the sort that Churchill asked of the British people as they faced years of grueling warfare against Nazi Germany; deep social cooperation to solve deep  problems, not just starry-eyed rhetoric penned by a twenty-seven year old.

Suppose that the U.S. had a well-respected political leader available, one with a history of successfully addressing problems of social welfare, the sort of problems that the economic crisis will generate and exacerbate and which will have to be addressed if the the social - and therefore, economic- fabric of the country are to be restitched.

To this point in our thought experiment it might seeem quite obvious that the U.S. would turn to this leader. But now, include these variables: this leader is 66 years old and looks and acts consistent with that age; this leader is a woman; this leader is openly gay and has listed her domestic partner on official websites since such websites have been in place; this leader is a highly ambitious politician, somebody who sought to develop and cultivate her own political following, although also has shown the ability and willingness to work with and across political dividing lines.

Try to figure out which variable would most weigh against this person as the choice to lead the United States in time of such crisis.

Apparently, none of them are preventing Iceland from coalescing around Johanna Sigardardottir (right) as the Iceland's choice for its next Prime Minister.

Meanwhile, check this out:

The almost equal gender balance of AMs in the Welsh assembly has transformed how politics in Wales is conducted, according to a new report.

Congratulations, Kirsten Gillibrand

Note to readers: I have been ill - nothing serious but not well enough to write and even now will have to be brief - thank you for your patience during the lull.

In early December, I stated my own preference for Kirsten Gillibrand for appointment to the New York State Senate seat opened by Secretary of State Clinton's decision to move to the Executive branch. As I wrote recently, Gillibrand was neither the only woman suitable for a gubernatorial appointment nor the only suitable person. But kudos to Governor Paterson, who is taking all sorts of heat for the appointment (not surprising in the snakes nest of New York state politics), for sticking to his word and his principles about a) filling the seat with a woman, especially so that the 2010 ticket of state-wide office runners in New York would definitely include a woman incumbent (that's the 51 Percent spirit) and b) using his own judgment and not being jockeyed by New York state dynastic politicians (whether the dynasty be Kennedy or Cuomo).

I cannot know all the reasons Governor Paterson chose Gillibrand, and surely many were "political" - e.g. related to his belief that selecting her would be good for his chances for reelection; or for New York State Democrats in general. Even if one went into 2008 with a less jaded view of politics (which I did not) nobody could come out of it with such a naive one as to think that such factors played no roll in his choice.

Indeed, this is part of why I applaud the choice of Gillibrand. A Democrat who has twice won in a majority Republican congressional district, this is no untested politician (note to those complaining about her "lack of experience" - see e.g. our just-elected President; were you raising that complaint about him, either when he ran for Senate or for President?)

Gillibrand is more conservative than I am on a number of issues: her take on the Second Amendment, in particular, commits her to a view about individual rights to own guns with which I disagree, although on the relevant vote in Congress in which she has participated she voted for improved background checks on gun purchasers with a history of mental illness. But on other issues, including reproductive rights, her voting record makes me smile at the prospect of eliminating the domestic versions of the gag rule that President Obama has eliminated in the international context. On still other issues, I am, as is so often the cases in democratic politics (small "d", please note) in partial agreement or partial disagreement, but can easily comprehend the reasonableness of Gillibrand's view. For example, in the absence of an extension of the precedent of Loving v. Virginia, the Supreme Court case that recognized the unconstitutionality of laws prohibiting interracial marriage to to same sex couples, Gillibrand is for a federal law permitting same-sex civil union and leaving the issue to states as to what to term this union. What I like about Gillibrand is that she takes her own position seriously: while I might prefer a champion of legislation for same sex-sex marriage, a liberal committed to federalism, can, in the absence of a Supreme Court decision mandating the extension of the institution of marriage, coherently maintain a preference for the a federal law permitting civil unions, while leaving to the states the question of what to call these unions.

Kirsten Gillibrand is a nuanced politician. And she's a young woman by political standards, at 42 the youngest member of the Senate. As we have seen, youth favors rising politicians, especially those who would be President. Kirsten Gillibrand may or may not develop politically in ways that would make enough of her positions strongly appealing to me to get behind her as a rising contender for the Presidency. But the idea is not far-fetched. So, for the first time in many weeks my heart is unequivocally warmed by a development on the national political scene.

Read this news article to get a wellrounded characterization of Kirsten Gillibrand.

Appointing a successor to Senator Clinton: Governor Paterson's opportunity to distinguish between the end of 51 Percent and the means of affirmative action

(Cross-posted from Founder's Blog, 51 Percent)

Governor Paterson has an instructive opportunity when he appoints a successor to Senator Clinton. If he chooses, he can illustrate beautifully why moving the baseline of representation of women toward 51 percent has nothing to do with affirmative action - at least not affirmative action based on gender. Since affirmative action remains a contentious instrument of social engineering, and because shifting the baseline to 51 percent women in every sphere of public life is a contentious project, it would be useful were Governor Paterson to take the opportunity to make the distinction clear in practice, especially in such a high profile appointment. One contentious matter at a time, please.

In a world where the baseline was proportional representation of women in every sphere of civil, social, and political life, women would occupy just over half the places in public spheres. For the Senate, which has 100 members, the goal would be to have slightly more women than men overall, or consider per state, one woman and one man from each, leading to a 50/50 split. Pause here. Really picture that: a Senate with 50 women and 50 men working alongside one another. Think about how much misogyny and sexism would fall by the wayside simply because of the change in the men's club feel of one our country's most visible political institutions. Think about how strange it is that we are not already at the point where this is not the gender proportion in that institution. Think what it would mean for the women of each state if they could reliably assume that one of their Senators would naturally enough be a woman - even a woman with very different political views than some of her women constituents, a woman whose life experience would almost certainly be more representative of the women citizens in her home state in at least a few significant ways.

Even if this vision appeals to you, there might be a shadow cast over it. There is a tendency to conflate the idea of shifting the baseline of representation in public life to reflect the representation of women in the population with an endorsement of affirmative action, a term with multiple meanings. Many people have strong doubts about affirmative action under any interpretation. Some have qualms about its justness; others worry that it stigmatizes all members of a group who are perceived to have been its object.

In its strongest version, affirmative action accomplishes a particular state of representativeness in some area - a college entering class, a profession, a club, a team - by awarding positions to less qualified or competent candidates when more qualified or competent ones are available because the lesser candidates possess some feature irrelevant to qualifications or competency but because one has reasons unrelated to these considerations for seeking the desired representativeness. Strong affirmative action elicits the most discomfort and criticism even from those who urge the virtues of diversity in settings where it is a necessary means to achieve the desired outcome.

Purely on statistical grounds, strong affirmative action will be most instrumentally necessary when there are very few qualified or competent persons with the extra or additional characteristic desired or when there are simply very few persons with that characteristic. Because 51 percent of the population consists of women there is no sheer shortage of women to fill positions. Indeed because of this fact, a shortage of women will rarely be the obstacle to the baseline shift to 51 percent representation. In New York state at present, with regard to Senator Clinton's soon to be vacant Senate seat, neither is there a lack of qualified, competent women candidates. At least two women on the radar screen seem to have qualifications and competencies that would serve an appointed Senator and her or his constituents well: Carolyn Maloney and Kirsten Gillibrand, for example. For purposes of brevity, I am not going to delve deeply into the questions of which competencies and qualifications matter uniquely when a public servant - in this case the Governor - is appointing somebody to fill a position usually filled by election. Suffice it to say that while an individual voter may, arguably, reasonably cast her or his vote for any candidate on any basis, a public servant who is filling the seat in trust for the electorate must have reasons, and to be satisfactory those reasons should answer to the requirements of getting the job of the office done. Just as Andrew Cuomo or Jerrold Nadler would seem to meet this threshold so too do Maloney and Gillibrand.

So, why does the impending appointment present any question of affirmative action at all? The short answer, it does not.  In these circumstances, there is no question of whether there are available qualified woman for appointment to the seat. If one accepts our starting premise - the good of shifting the baseline toward proportional representation according to gender - that, it would seem, to be that.

But life is rarely so tidy. There is another woman would-be candidate on the horizon, who IS seeking affirmative action to gain the appointment.  Caroline Kennedy. Ms. Kennedy is not seeking affirmative action on grounds of her gender, though. She is seeking a form of affirmative action more usually seen in admission to elite institutions of higher education, where some applicants are favored over others because their forebears went there. In academia, these students are known as "legacies".  I cannot know for sure, but I am comfortable hypothesizing that President George W. Bush was the beneficiary of some form of affirmative action, possibly strong, when he was admitted to Yale University for his undergraduate degree. George W. Bush's great great-grandfather, grandfather, and father all attended Yale, so his chances of admittance regardless of his qualifications and competencies were fairly high. Indeed at the time George W. Bush was admitted to Yale, I doubt if much consideration was given to the question of whether favoring him over a more qualified candidate even counted as any kind of affirmative action. Even now, paying attention to whether other family members have attended a particular college or university is rarely put in terms of affirmative action, even though such attention clearly counts as affirmative action if it advantages a candidate over others more qualified for the spot.

The most common minimally credible justification given for the legacy system in college or university admissions is that gaining a family's loyalty to the institution may pay off in terms of monetary contributions to the college or university. I do not take up the ultimate soundness of this justification here.

When it comes to gubernatorial selection to the U.S. Senate, one rarely hears the precisely equivalent justification offered so bluntly.
Although, this argument might credibly be made if one believes that other Senators or the Obama administration would be more likely to make appropriations to New York at Ms. Kennedy's behest than they would for those Senators whose parent and uncles have not served in high federal office, let alone been victims of horrifying assassinations while in office or seeking election to it. Pundits and commentators have bandied similar justification for Ms. Kennedy's appointment, however, when they discuss "electability." If whoever is appointed to fill Senator Clinton's seat now chooses to run for it in 2010 and wins, that person will have year of seniority over non-incumbents from other states, and seniority secures benefits for a Senator and hence for her or his state. Some think that based on her family history and related ability to raise funds for election in 2010 and then again in 2012, this makes it a good idea to appoint Caroline Kennedy to the Senate now.

These arguments from potential influence or eventual seniority might seem like arguments based on qualification rather than arguments from affirmative action.  The problem is that in this case the advantage of influence and possible future seniority turn on a first step based on affirmative action. If a candidate who is not a legacy is appointed now, and she or he gains influence and wins seniority on the merits of (relatively) non-accidental attributes (the family into which one is born is an accidental attribute), affirmative action plays no role in the benefits that accrue to New York state. But if the Governor appoints a legacy because he believes she or he can bring these benefits but has no other particular qualifications or competencies, especially compared to available alternatives, the Governor is rewarding an accidental attribute of birth - family - and, he is not doing so to secure the baseline of proportional representation for women, but for some of the more traditional rationales used for political exceptionalism.

I cannot take the time here to fully explore the questions surrounding affirmative action for legacy appointments to government in a democracy. Perhaps the simplest way to point out the chief problem is that a populist democracy aspires to assign political office on the basis of election not heredity. In practice, it is not so simple, but that's the ideal and outright relying on a candidate's heredity to gain a leg up for one's state runs straight up against it.

What must be made clear here is the consistency in wanting Governor Paterson to contribute to proportional representation for women while objecting to him appointing Caroline Kennedy. Governor Paterson is in the lucky position of having various qualified, competent women to consider for the appointment. He need not cloud the issue with considerations of affirmative action based either on gender or family background. Thus, he can illustrate the way in which the end of proportional representation for the 51 percent of the population that are women has nothing to do with the means of affirmative action of any kind.

Kagan and Johnsen: two interesting picks for top positions in the Department of Justice

President Elect Obama has announced the appointment of Elena Kagan as Solicitor General and Dawn E. Johnsen as head of the Office of Legal Counsel, two top posts at the Department of Justice. Both have excelled in the legal field, both in academia and government positions. Kagan has considerable administrative experience, having served as a successful dean of a notoriously difficult to manage institution - Harvard Law School.

Elena Kagan not only clerked for Thurgood Marshall, but she follows in his footsteps;  one of the stops in Marshall's distinguished career was as Solicitor General. (For information about the role of the Solicitor General - and a fun read - go here.)

Listen to Johnsen herself on the growth of the imperial presidency under George W. Bush and the appropriate role of the Office of Legal Counsel in ensuring that the president acts within Constitutionally assigned boundaries. Johnsen's opposition to secret law is particularly noteworthy.

Let us hope that Congress quickly confirms both these appointments; Johnsen's confirmation will merit special vigilance by liberals, because members of Congress who favor the repressive tactics of the Bush-Cheney administration will certainly be critical of this very outspoken advocate for civil liberties in a time when all too many people have been willing to see them curtailed.

Women of Interest: An occasional series, entry 3: Helen Suzman

I hate bullies and like simple justice
--Helen Suzman

From the BBC:

Anti-apartheid icon Suzman buried

Top politicians and close friends attended Helen Suzman's close friends

Hundreds of mourners have attended the funeral of South Africa's celebrated anti-apartheid campaigner Helen Suzman, who died on New Year's Day aged 91.

Mrs Suzman, who for years was the only lawmaker to openly condemn the whites-only regime, was buried in a private Jewish ceremony in Johannesburg.

The mourners included President Kgalema Motlanther and the last leader of apartheid regime, F W de Klerk.

Mr de Klerk described Mrs Suzman as "one of South Africa's great icons".

"Suzman was my mentor, she was opposed to the abuse of power by the old apartheid regime," South Africa's opposition leader Helen Zille - who also attended the funeral - said.

"She was also opposed to the current abuses of power by the current ANC [African National Congress] government," Ms Zille added.

For 13 years, Mrs Suzman, the daughter of Jewish Lithuanian immigrants, was the only MP to openly condemn South Africa's whites-only apartheid regime.

She was made an honorary dame by Queen Elizabeth II in 1989. She was also twice-nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.

'Corageous woman'

Mrs Suzman, who had been in a frail condition recently, died at her home in Johannesburg early on Thursday.

Mrs Suzman stepped down from parliament in 1989

She first entered the South African parliament in 1953, soon becoming a thorn in the side of the apartheid regime, says the BBC's Peter Biles, in Johannesburg.

She was a frequent visitor of jailed ANC leader Nelson Mandela when he was held in Robben Island prison for 18 years.

Mr Mandela - who was elected South Africa's first black president in 1994 - wrote of her in his biography: "It was an odd and wonderful sight to see this courageous woman peering into our cells and strolling around our courtyard. She was the first and only woman ever to grace our cells."

After stepping down from parliament in 1989, Mrs Suzman continued to speak out against what she saw as the failings of the post-apartheid ANC administration.

Mrs Suzman was born in Germiston, Gauteng, on 7 November 1917.

In 1937 she married doctor Moses Meyer Suzman. The couple later had two daughters.

See also: BBC obituary, coverage of Suzman's life from the (South Africa) Mail and Guardian, and the Helen Suzman Foundation.

Go get 'em, Landrieu and Snowe!

Landrieu, Snowe Make History: First Two Women to Lead a Full Congressional Committee: Join Forces to Advance Aggressive Agenda to Assist Small Businesses in America

Congratulations to two pathbreaking women in the U.S. Senate!