Bush urged to look beyond career judge

(Correction: Because of an editing error, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor was misidentified as a former Arizona Supreme Court justice in a Page One story yesterday about a White House meeting on judicial nominations. She served on the Arizona Court of Appeals.)

WASHINGTON -- In their first formal meeting on the Supreme Court vacancy, Senate Judiciary Committee leaders urged President Bush yesterday to look for a nominee who has broader experience than the US bench. The push may boost the prospects of Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales.

Following a breakfast at the White House, the Judiciary Committee chairman, Arlen Specter, a Republican of Pennsylvania, and the ranking Democrat, Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont, said they had told the president that the Supreme Court could benefit from a justice who isn't a career judge and who has a closer understanding than judges of how most people live their lives, such as a former senator or governor.

''When you're a practicing lawyer and then you move up to the district court and then the circuit court, you have very narrow parameters," Specter said after the meeting, which included the Senate majority leader, Bill Frist, and the minority leader, Harry Reid.

''You look at records, you read cases, you have very little contact with people," Specter said. ''But if they had a little more practical experience and didn't work so much within the footnotes and the semicolons, you might have a little different perspective."

Of the current justices, only Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist and retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor weren't federal judges when they were elevated.

Rehnquist was a lawyer in President Richard Nixon's Office of Legal Counsel, and O'Connor -- a former trial judge and Arizona Senate majority leader -- was a state Supreme Court justice.

Among the often-mentioned candidates to fill O'Connor's seat, only Gonzales, a former Texas Supreme Court justice and a Bush appointee to government positions in Texas and Washington, fits such a profile.

At a closed door meeting of Senate Republicans yesterday, Specter reiterated his argument for a Supreme Court candidate who isn't a federal judge. He reminded his colleagues that the Supreme Court that handed down the 1954 school desegregation decision in Brown v. Board of Education included three former senators and one former governor.

Adding to the sense of momentum on behalf of Gonzales, Senator Sam Brownback -- a staunch conservative who sits on the Judiciary Committee -- said yesterday that he has invited Gonzales to meet with him, since Gonzales is widely considered a top candidate.

Some conservative groups, wary that Gonzales won't stand against abortion rights, have warned Bush against selecting him. Though he is aware of those concerns, Brownback said, he simply wants to discuss Gonzales' interpretation of the Constitution.

''There's so much discussion swirling around him in this consultative time period that we're in," said Brownback, a Kansas Republican, who added that he has not heard back from Gonzales about a meeting.

''I'd like to hear just his overarching view of the Constitution. No specific questions more than that, just his view of the Constitution and its role and his interpretation of it."

The senators involved in yesterday's meeting said Bush did not mention names of potential nominees, and talked in broad terms about the confirmation process and the sort of candidates he's considering.

Democrats, however, did mention candidates, and Gonzales was one of four Hispanic nominees discussed at yesterday's White House meeting. According to a Democratic aide, Leahy suggested three judges whom Democrats are inclined to support: Sonia Sotomayor of the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals, Ed Prado of the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, and Ricardo Hinojosa, a federal district court judge in Texas. All were appointed by Republican presidents.

Reid yesterday also endorsed Senator Judd Gregg, Republican of New Hampshire, as a candidate for the high court whom he could support. The Nevada Democrat had named four other GOP senators whom he considered strong candidates: Lindsey O. Graham of South Carolina, Mel Martinez of Florida, Mike Crapo of Idaho, and Mike DeWineof Ohio.

Reid has said that he believes Gonzales is qualified to be a Supreme Court justice, but said his confirmation may not be easy. Gonzales has come under fire for a memo that Democrats say was an endorsement of policies that allowed the administration to torture terror suspects.

Bush did not respond to the Democrats' suggestions, according to the senators at the meeting. The president told reporters yesterday that he was ''closer today than I was yesterday" to choosing a new justice, but did not indicate that a choice was imminent.

''I am going to be deliberate in the process because I want the American people to know that, when I finally make a decision, it's going to be one based upon a lot of research and a lot of thought," Bush said.

The selection of Supreme Court justices from within the federal judiciary is a relatively recent trend. Early chief justices John Jay and John Marshall came to the court after political careers, and more recent chief justices included former President William Howard Taft and former Governor Earl Warren of California.

Leahy said a candidate from ''outside the judicial monastery" could be more likely to gain bipartisan support in the Senate, making for a potentially easier confirmation process since the nominee wouldn't have a deeply entrenched legal philosophy and could seek consensus on the court.

''The president can certainly nominate somebody who would unite us and not divide us, somebody who would go through with a vast majority of both Republicans and Democrats voting for him or her," Leahy said.

In a speech on the Senate floor yesterday afternoon, Frist said that Bush and his aides have approached more than 60 of the 100 senators, including more than half of the 44 Democrats, to discuss the vacancy. Frist said that consultation is purely the president's prerogative, and that he's not obliged to take any senator's advice.

''Despite this unprecedented effort by the president, I am concerned that no amount of consultation will be sufficient for some of my colleagues," Frist said. ''Some senators may prefer to choose the nominee for the president, but that is not how the Constitution works."

After the meeting, Reid said that he would like Bush to give Democrats his short list of finalists before he makes a nomination, so that Democrats can ''red flag" those they find troublesome.

Bush's meeting with the four key lawmakers was part of the White House's efforts to respond to senators' demand that they be consulted as Bush narrows his list of candidates for the court.

But Senator Edward M. Kennedy, the Massachusetts Democrat and a senior member of the judiciary committee, said true consultation involves Bush offering cues as to his thinking to senators, not just soliciting advice.

''I hope we are not just going through the motions," Kennedy said in an interview. ''True consultation is not a one-sided conversation. The president must share his thoughts with all of us as well."

Rick Klein can be reached at rklein@globe.com.