Legal News

Holder Breezes Through Senate Confirmation; A Happy Ending?

By Jennifer Forsyth

The story of Eric Holder’s confirmation went like this: Once upon a time, President Obama had worked it all out for Holder to become the first African-American Attorney General. And why not? The main character of our story held a distinguished resume as a former prosecutor and judge, not to mention the No. 2 in the Justice Department under President Clinton.

But any good bedtime story has a monster and for Holder it came in the form of Marc Rich, whose pardon in the final days of the Clinton administration kept creeping up and scaring everybody. And then the monsters multiplied, this time in the form of his controversial push for clemency for 16 members of two violent Puerto Rican militant groups back in 1999. But Holder pushes on, only to face one last set of foes in the Senate, namely Republican Senators John Cornyn (TX) and Tom Coburn (Okla.) who suspected that Holder didn’t like the 2nd Amendment as much as they do.

However, our story had a decided anti-climax tonight when Holder sailed through the Senate vote, 75-21. Tell us, Law Blog readers, is this a happy ending? It likely depends on where you sit on such topics as waterboarding, which Holder called torture. Regardless, until tomorrow, sweet dreams.

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on February 02, 2009 (boomark / email).