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Mock Hearings Help Miers Prepare

Posted on: Friday, 21 October 2005, 15:00 CDT

By Elisabeth Bumiller New York Times News Service

WASHINGTON -- The briefing books are the same. The White House and Justice Department inquisitors are the same. Even the questions are largely the same, like queries about abortion rights, the right to privacy and the 14th Amendment.

The difference, of course, is that the lead character has changed, as has the political climate. Harriet E. Miers, the unobtrusive White House counsel who helped run the so-called murder boards that prepared Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. for his Senate confirmation hearings, is now the one whose future life as a Supreme Court justice is at stake.

For Roberts, whose years of practice before the Supreme Court left him well-versed in the nuances of constitutional law, the murder boards represented a refresher course. For Miers, an experienced lawyer but one whose career has focused on business matters, the cram sessions represent her last, best chance to prepare for what senators have promised will be an intense and extensive questioning on constitutional law and her qualifications.

Miers, whose confirmation hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee are scheduled to begin Nov. 7, has so far practiced in three mock hearings of three to five hours each, the most recent one on Tuesday. A White House official said Miers and her team planned at least a dozen more, about the same number as for Roberts.

The sessions, held in a conference room of the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, are led by Rachel Brand, the director of the Office of Legal Policy at the Justice Department and a former Supreme Court clerk for Justice Anthony M. Kennedy. The term murder board grew out of the American military and its tough, formalized system of preparing officers for presentations.

A team of about 10 members is running through the entire range of questions put to Roberts in his Senate hearings last month, White House officials and Republicans said. But the group, anticipating a grilling from the Judiciary Committee about Miers' credentials, has also lobbed practice questions about her qualifications for the job.

"She knows she's going to be getting questions that will differ in some way from Judge Roberts, simply because she brings a different experience and perspective to the hearings," said Daniel R. Coats, a former Republican senator from Indiana and a former ambassador to Germany, who is helping to shepherd Miers through what has turned out to be a rocky confirmation process on Capitol Hill.

Questions about qualifica- tions were not an issue for Roberts, a federal appellate judge and a former Harvard Law Review managing editor who had argued 39 cases before the Supreme Court. Miers, a former corporate lawyer and president of the State Bar of Texas, has never been a judge, prompting an uproar from some conservatives who say they are unsure of her conservative and intellectual credentials for the job.

Controversy continued to follow Miers this week when Republican and Democratic leaders of the Senate Judiciary Committee sharply criticized many of her answers to a Senate judicial questionnaire and asked her to submit more complete responses by Oct. 26.

Abortion rights groups expressed concern on Tuesday at the disclosure that Miers, as a candidate for the Dallas City Council in 1989, filled out a survey from an anti-abortion group indicating that she favored banning abortion except to save the life of a pregnant woman. Coats said that the murder board team had also questioned Miers about whether she would vote to overturn Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion.

Her response?

"You know what the answer is," Coats said in a telephone interview. "It's the same as Ginsburg said, it's the same as Breyer said, it's the same as Roberts said. It's just not appropriate to ask a nominee how they're going to vote on a particular matter."

Coats was referring to Justices Ruth Bader Ginsberg and Stephen G. Breyer and Chief Justice Roberts.

Eager to dispel perceptions of Miers as a presidential sidekick undeserving of a seat on the highest court in the land, Coats and White House officials described her performance in the sessions as unruffled and impressive, although far different in style from Roberts.

"She's soft-spoken and reserved," Coats said. "She's very gracious. And she's very humble. And so I think her response comes across differently from somebody who is more assertive in their speaking. But it doesn't mean that the context isn't there."

In sum, Coats said, Miers leaves an impression of "someone very thoughtful, someone who's not just reciting rote answers." He said he took issue with the blunt assessment of Sen. Arlen Specter, R- Pa., the Judiciary Committee chairman, who said this month that Miers needed a "crash course in constitutional law" and that murder boards would not be enough.

Ed Gillespie, the former Republican National Committee chairman who is helping the White House sell the nomination, said Miers was at an advantage in her preparations because she had so thoroughly covered the same material with Roberts.

"Obviously, it is a much different role to be the preparer rather than the preparee," said Gillespie, who has attended the mock hearings of Miers and Roberts. "But that exercise has been an advantage to her. Having helped him prepare was helpful to her."

So far, only White House and Justice Department insiders have taken part in the mock sessions, among them William Kelly, the deputy White House counsel.

Coats said he expected that outsiders would be invited to ask questions as the mock hearings progressed, as was the case with Roberts. He said he also expected there to be a formal re-creation of a Senate hearing, with participants playing the role of specific senators, as there also was late in the process with Roberts.

For now, Coats said, the sessions were more informal.

"A lot of time it's not so much the question as it is the discussion," he said. "Like, 'Let's take a look at the 14th Amendment. What is your thought about the impact of the 14th Amendment on privacy,' et cetera, et cetera."

How did Miers answer?

"Well, tune into the hearings," Coats said.

Source: Deseret News (Salt Lake City)

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