That’s the title of my new Confirmation Tales post. An excerpt:

Early on a cold Saturday morning in March 1993, I headed to the NBC News studio to accompany Senator Orrin Hatch for an interview on NBC’s Today show. The day before, Justice Byron White had informed President Clinton that he would retire when the Court’s term ended (in late June or early July)….
As the leading Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, Senator Hatch would be expected to try to condition the environment to make it as costly as possible for Clinton to select a liberal justice. NBC News was eager to learn Hatch’s views, and I had provided him with a one-pager of solid talking points on standing strong against liberal judicial activism.
The interview had barely started when Hatch volunteered that he thought that Marian Wright Edelman would make a fine Supreme Court justice.
What?!? Seated in front of the studio stage, I nearly fell off my chair.

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One note on last week’s post: I ended the post with what I intended as a teaser, cutting off in mid-sentence with an ellipsis. Some readers instead thought that they hadn’t received the full post. My apologies for the confusion. Every subscriber, free or paid, will receive the full content (at least for the foreseeable future).