With stakes raised, Democrats seek more background on nominee

WASHINGTON -- John G. Roberts Jr.'s nomination to be chief justice yesterday cast new attention on the White House's refusal to release any documents related to Roberts' tenure as the number two official in the solicitor general's office from 1989 until 1993, the high point of his government service so far.

Democrats and liberal interest groups yesterday insisted that the documents could provide a far broader picture of Roberts' legal philosophy and views on matters such as affirmative action and abortion, and they argued that Roberts' new nomination to be chief of the high court made the release of any available papers more critical.

''Before the Senate acts on John Roberts's new nomination, we should know even more about his record," said Senator Edward M. Kennedy, Democrat of Massachusetts and a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Senator Charles Schumer, a New York Democrat, added: ''Given the even greater importance of this new position, we hope the White House will reconsider its refusal to release relevant and important documents that will shed light on what kind of chief justice Judge Roberts would become."

The White House has refused to release any papers from Roberts's time as deputy solicitor general under the president's father, and has held back some other papers related to Roberts's earlier service in the Reagan administration, citing privacy concerns and attorney-client privilege. Democrats are also annoyed at a missing file on affirmative action that was apparently misplaced by the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library.

But the Bush administration said yesterday it would not change its policy on the documents, and conservative supporters of Roberts echoed the White House.

The administration already has ''provided them with an enormous amount of information to be able to move forward on his nomination, so we think that the Senate will be able to move in a timely manner to get him in place and give him a fair hearing," presidential press secretary Scott McClellan, traveling with Bush in Louisiana and Mississippi, told reporters yesterday.

''We've provided them tens of thousands of pages of documents and we'll continue to work to make sure the Senate has what they need," he said.

Some liberal interest groups had already announced their opposition to Roberts' nomination to be associate justice on the Supreme Court. Material in the undisclosed papers, they believe, may give them more information on his record and more ammunition to battle his appointment.

But the demand for records also exposes a deeper rift congressional Democrats have with the Bush administration over secrecy and the role of Congress as a check on executive branch power.

The administration has been stingy in its interpretation of the Freedom of Information Act, refusing to release many details related to Vice President Dick Cheney's Energy Task Force, which crafted much of the energy policy act passed this summer. The administration has also refused to release documents Democrats wanted on other nominees, including UN ambassador John Bolton. Fury over the administration's secrecy led Democrats to temporarily block his confirmation.

Since Roberts was first nominated for the Supreme Court in July, the administration has provided about 50,000 pages of documents to the Senate Judiciary Committee, all from his work in the Reagan administration. The Reagan library last month said it had discovered more documents related to Roberts's service in the White House counsel's office during Reagan's presidency, and the administration is reviewing them.

Shannen Coffin, a personal friend of Roberts and a former deputy assistant attorney general in the senior President Bush's administration, said revealing Roberts's papers from his time in Bush's Justice Department would damage future Justice Department lawyers. If solicitors general believe their confidential work may one day be exposed to the public, they won't be able to give candid advice, he said.

''There is an important privilege that's at stake here. This is a principled stand by the Justice Department and the president," Coffin said, noting that the current Bush administration declined to release Clinton presidential documents on similar grounds.

Senator John Cornyn, Republican of Texas and the only former judge on the judiciary panel, said Roberts is ''the most scrutinized nominee in history," and cited Democrats' complaints about not having enough time to review documents they already have.

''The president's opponents can't have it both ways -- they can't say with a straight face that there are too many documents to go through, and then say they need even more," Cornyn said.