In 1788 Alexander Hamilton foresaw the danger that a President might try to nominate someone like Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court.
That is, someone who came from the President’s state, who was personally allied to him, who was so pliable as to be the “obsequious instrument of his pleasure” (dear God, please send me such a woman; who knew the Federalist Papers had such an erotic ring?).
Hamilton thought that a President would be ashamed to do this. As Bush should be.
Here’s an excerpt from the History News Network’s instructive article, “What Did the Federalist Papers Say About Supreme Court Appointments?” Alexander Hamilton said:
He [the President] would be both ashamed and afraid to bring forward, for the most distinguished or lucrative stations, candidates who had no other merit than that of coming from the same State to which he particularly belonged, or of being in some way or other personally allied to him, or of possessing the necessary insignificance and pliancy to render them the obsequious instruments of his pleasure.
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