Friday, September 18, 1987/The Jewish Floridian of Tampa Page 11-B
Coalition Asks
Graham To
Oppose Judge Bork
By ALISA KWITNEY
Jewish Floridian Staff Writer
A coalition of major
(organizations including
[American Jewish Congress,
the National Organization of
[Women, the National
[Lawyers' Guild and the
[American Civil Liberties
| Union, met with Senator Bob
Graham (D-Fla.) to express op-
position to the nomination of
[judge Robert Bork to the
| Supreme Court. The session
was held recently in Graham's
I Miami office.
The coalition, which was
organized by Michael D. Ray,
I president of the South Florida
Chapter of the National
Lawyers' Guild, also included
the NAACP and the AFL-CIO.
A press conference at the Paul
Walter Mini-Park followed the
19 a.m. meeting.
The Miami discussion came
I in the wake of widespread op-
position to President Reagan's
nomination of Judge Bork.
JHadassah, the Women's
[Zionist Organization of
America, with 385,000
members nationwide, has
[broken with its tradition of
[neither opposing nor endors-
ing political candidates or
presidential appointees by
/oting unanimously to oppose
9ork s candidacy for the
Jupreme Court.
"People are alarmed by the
lomination of Judge Bork,
scause they think he will
change the nature of the court,
id make it far less liberal
than it was," Ray said.
"Bork would replace Justice
[Powell, who is retiring, and
[Powell was considered a swing
[vote in issues involving in-
dividual liberties," Ray
I asserted.
Supreme Court justices are
nominated by the President,
after which the Senate
Judiciary Committee makes a
recommendation to the entire
Senate, which votes to either
accept or reject the
nomination.
Sen. Joseph Biden (D-Del.),
chairman of the Judiciary
Committee, commissioned a
report on Bork, and has come
out against him. The commit-
tee began hearings Tuesday,
Sept. 15.
"There's lots of disinforma-
tion going on," Ray contends.
"The White House would have
the public believe that Bork is
for judicial restraint, and for
giving deference to legislative
intent on issues, but the fact is
that his opinions show that this
is not true.
"He will defer to legislative
intent only if he agrees with
the outcome of the case, and
the same goes for judicial
restraint," says Ray, citing the
case of Planned Parenthood
Vs. Heckler in 1983, when
Bork ruled that minors had to
have parental consent before
receiving contraceptives from
family planning centers.
"Congressional intent was
to improve access of minors to
family planning services, in-
cluding contraceptives," says
Ray.
It is the role of the Supreme
Court to interpret laws passed
by the legislative branch of the
government, but opinions vary
on how the court should exer-
cise this function.
The White House has issued
a release defining "the judicial
restraint view," seen by some
as restricting Supreme Court
Justices from writing orders
and opinions based on their in-
terpretations of laws passed
by Congress and the states.
But Ray argues that Bork,
who states that he is a propo-
nent of judicial restraint, "will
even find new interpretations
of the Constitution to support
his argument if there's a case
which involves protecting or
increasing the rights of multi-
national corporations, even if
his interpretations come into
conflict with Supreme Court
precedents or settled
statutes."
Says Ray, "Bork criticizes
the three-department system
of government, which is a
system of checks and balances.
He has said that if a war is
started, it should be up to the
executive branch, and that the
legislative branch should not
interfere.
"Congress can start or end a
war," explains Ray, "but Bork
has questioned its Constitu-
tional right to place a check on
the executive branch while a
war is in progress. That would
mean that the executive
branch could do whatever it
wanted during a war."
The War Powers Act limits
the President's right to deploy
troops unilaterally, acting on
his own without Congressional
consent or input. According to
Ray, Bork has stated that the
War Powers Act is "probably
unconstitutional.''
"Bork even said in one case
that it's all right for congress
to make a law that would
eliminate the right of any
federal court to review a con-
stitutional challenge of
presidential action," which,
Ray points out, "would mean
that if the President were do-
ing anything unconstitutional,
as in the firing of a special
Watergate prosecutor, no
court would have the right to
JERUSALEM MAYOR DEMONSTRATES
 Long time Mayor of Jerusalem, Teddy
Kollek, (left,) at make-sift office complete with
staffers outside the Prime Ministers residence
this morning to protest Tiyzak Shamir's
AP/Wide World Photo
refusal-to-date to give permission for a Sports
Stadium to be buUt in Jerusalem. Sign behind
Mayor Kollek demands permission signatures
from Prime Minister and the Inter for
Minister.
challenge that action."
Bork maintained this posi-
tion during the Watergate
trial, Ray adds.
"What all this means is that
the government could spy on
you, infringe on your privacy,
violate your first amendment
and constitutional rights, and
you could not challenge its
behavior in court," contends
Ray. "That's exactly like the
McCarthy era or like a
totalitarian society," Ray
maintains. "That's the op-
posite of democracy."
The issue of Bork's nomina-
tion, Ray believes, is not an
issue of Republican vs.
Democrat, or conservative vs.
liberal.
"Senator Graham said at the
conference that deciding
whether or not to oppose
Bork's nomination is probably
the most important decision of
his career as a senator," re-
counts Ray, who calls Bork's
nomination "a danger to
everyone, liberal, Democrat,
Republican, and
conservative."
Supreme Court Justices re-
tain their positions for life, or
until they retire, and "Bork
could effect the outcome of
Supreme Court decisions and
our system of justice for the
next 20 to 30 years," Ray
points out.
A statement issued by
Hadassah opposing Bork's
nominations says that "Judge
Bork has expressed support
for prayer in the public schools
and public funding of private
religious schools ... and has
indicated that he would uphold
the authority of states and
localities to ban the use of con-
traceptives by married
couples."
As President Reagan
prepares to leave his final term
in the White House, he is
nominating a candidate for the
Supreme Court who will re-
main as a legacy for many
years to come.
The question is, what kind of
legacy would Bork be?
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