Date: January 12, 2006
Senator: Witness - Aldisert
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SPECTER: Thank you very much, Judge Barry.
We turn now to Judge Ruggero Aldisert, with a bachelor's degree from the University of Pittsburgh in 1942 and a law degree from the same institution in 1947, with intervening service in the Marine Corps.
He served on the court of common pleas of Allegheny County from 1961 to 1968, at which point he was appointed to the 3rd Circuit by President Lyndon Johnson.
Judge Aldisert and I were reminiscing about my predecessor, Senator -- yet to be a judge, Senator Joe Clark, whose seat I now occupy.
He was chief judge from 1984 to 1986 and took senior status in 1986. He has been a adjunct professor at the University of Pittsburgh and has served with Judge Alito on the 3rd Circuit for the past 15 years.
Thank you for coming all the way from California, Judge Aldisert, to be with us today. And we look forward to your testimony.
ALDISERT: Thank you, sir.
Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, I thank you for this invitation to offer my views on my colleague.
But, before proceeding into my formal statement, I want the record to show that there was a discussion this morning about ages of judges. Well, I am an old man. And I will tell you how old I am.
(LAUGHTER)
There's a certain distinguished United States senator sitting up there who I swore in as a lawyer in the city of Pittsburgh over 40 years ago. And that's Orrin Hatch.
(LAUGHTER)
And I will also say that I presided over the first jury trial that he ever tried. And he won the case.
LEAHY: Oh, that's sweet, Orrin.
HATCH: I'm glad you said that, Judge. They don't believe it.
(LAUGHTER)
LEAHY: I never knew you won one. That's nice.
(LAUGHTER)
SPECTER: They've always gotten along very well together, Senator Leahy and Senator Hatch.
ALDISERT: When I first testified before this committee in 1968, I was seeking confirmation of my own nomination to the federal circuit court. I speak now as the I speak now as the most senior judge on the 3rd circuit.
And I begin my brief testimony with some personal background.
ALDISERT: In May 1960, I campaigned with John F. Kennedy in the critical presidential primaries of West Virginia.
The next year, I ran for judge, as was indicated, and I was on the Democratic ticket, and I served eight years as a state trial judge.
And as the chairman indicated, Senator Joseph Clark of Pennsylvania was my chief sponsor when President Lyndon Johnson nominated me to the Court of Appeals, and Senator Robert F. Kennedy from New York was one of my key supporters.
Now, why do I say this? I make this as a point that political loyalties become irrelevant when I became a judge. The same has been true in the case of Judge Alito, who served honorably in two Republican administrations before he was appointed to our court.
Judicial independence is simply incompatible with political loyalties, and Judge Alito's judicial record on our court bears witness to this fundamental truth.
I have been a judge for 45 of my 86 years. And based on my experience, I can represent to this committee that Judge Alito has to be included among the first rank of the 44 judges with whom I have served on the 3rd Circuit, and including another 50 judges on five other courts of appeals on which I have sat since taking senior status.
Moreover, I have been a longtime student of the judicial process. I have written four books on the subject and more than 30 law review articles. And this study required me to study the current work of 22 justices of the U.S. Supreme Court. And I've read hundreds of opinions of appellate judges of every federal circuit, every state, and every political stripe.
And the great Cardozo taught us long ago the judge, even when he is free, is not wholly free. He is not to innovate at pleasure. This means that the crucial values of predictability, reliance and fundamental fairness must be honored.
ALDISERT: And as his judicial record makes plain, Judge Alito has taken this teaching to heart. He believes that legal outcomes will follow the law as dictated by the facts of the particular case, whether the facts involve commercial interests, government regulation or intimate relationships.
According to these criteria, Mr. Chairman, Judge Alito is already a great judge.
We who have heard his probing questions during oral argument, we who have been privy to his wise and insightful comments in our private decisional conferences, we who have observed at first hand his impartial approach to decision-making and his thoughtful judicial temperament and know his carefully crafted opinions, we who are his colleagues are convinced that he will also be a great justice.
If Justice Alito is confirmed, as I believe wholeheartedly he deserves to be, he will succeed a justice who has gained a reputation as a practical justice, whose resistance to ideologically driven solutions has positioned her as a swing vote on the court.
And as has been heard several times in this hearing, Justice O'Connor, in 1995, described her approach to judging. What she said then is even more important today. And I quote, "It cannot be too often stated that the greatest threats to our constitutional freedoms come in times of crisis. The only way for judges to mediate these conflicting impulses is to do what they should do anyway: Stay close to the record in each case that appears before them and make their judgments based on that alone."
And knowing Sam Alito as I do, I am struck by how accurately these words also describe the way in which he has performed his work as a United States circuit judge.
And that is why, with utmost enthusiasm, I recommend that he be confirmed as an associate justice on the Supreme Court.
And thank you, Mr. Chairman.
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