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Susan Svrluga
Reporter covering higher education for Grade Point blog
More than 2,400 law professors signed a letter stating that Supreme Court candidate Brett M. Kavanaugh had demonstrated a lack of judicial restraint at a Senate hearing last week. – behavior that would be disqualifying for any candidate in a court.
Kavanaugh was responding to the charges of a California professor, Christine Blasey Ford, of having sexually assaulted her at a home party in adolescence in the 1980s. At the hearing, he defended his innocence vehemently and scoffed at what he called "a calculated and orchestrated political coup".
Subsequently, law professors from across the country began to discuss "with great distress, the unprecedented and unfathomable behavior of Judge Kavanaugh," said Bernard Harcourt, a Columbia Law School professor.
The letter, which was sent to two US Senate offices on Thursday afternoon, stems from these conversations. "It was a spontaneous reaction to the hearing," Harcourt said.
The background wave was overwhelming, he said, with hundreds of lawyers from more than 160 law schools hired within hours.
The signatories included Martha Minow – the former dean of Harvard Law School, where Kavanaugh taught a popular course – other deans and former deans of law school, and scholars who had already supported Kavanaugh.
[Supreme Court nominee insists on his innocence, calls hearings ‘a national disgrace.’]
"As a person who knew and loved Brett Kavanaugh when we were collaborators, I did everything to stay out of this process and give him the benefit of the doubt." Said Mark Lemley, Stanford Law professor School. last week's hearing behavior "was not what we should expect from a Supreme Court judge, telling obvious lies about his origins, shouting to senators, refusing to answer questions and blaming his problems on others is not appropriate behavior. "
Harcourt said that they had signed because of the concern aroused by the rush of judgment, persuaded that the fact that the Kavanaugh Senate raises "without complete information and deliberation on the part of the Court supreme would undermine the respect due to the institution ".
The letter to the Senate cites two laws governing prejudice and disqualification, noting that "judges must withdraw if they are to be perceived or to be unfair. ..
"We have different views on Kavanaugh's other qualifications," they wrote. "But we are united, as law professors and specialists in judicial institutions, in thinking that Judge Kavanaugh has not shown the impartiality and judicial temperament necessary to sit in the highest court of our country. " '
Another letter, signed by some 900 law professors, asked the Senate to reject Kavanaugh's appointment. "… As a law professor, it is my duty to teach my student the highest standards of professionalism and decorum," wrote Karla McKanders, Professor of Law at Vanderbilt University Law School. , in an email. "The testimony of Judge Kavanaugh undermines the profession of lawyer and the authority of the Supreme Court."
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