In 1986 jeff sessions was nominated to a Federal Judge position. The senate, responsible to advise and consent for judicial appointments was controlled by Republicans at the time & the choice was made by Ronald Reagan. The Senate Judicial Committee was controlled by Strom Thurman, nobody's liberal, And yet sessions was not approved by the Judicial Committee. Two of the republicans on the committee voted against the nominee making the vote 10 to 8. This is noteworthy due to the fact that sessions was only the second judicial nominee in the last 48 years from that point in time to be rejected. The committee had "reasonable doubts" over Sessions' ability to be "fair and impartial." The nomination was withdrawn on July 31, 1986.
Some of the reasons for this decision were based on reported comments that sessions had made, prior to his nomination, and are listed below:
- “The NAACP, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, Operation PUSH and the National Council of Churches were all un-American organizations teaching anti-American values.”
- Organizations like the NAACP “force civil rights down the throats of people.”
- “I thought those guys [the Ku Klux Klan] were OK until I learned they smoked pot.”
- Author's note - this was supposedly a joke, according to sessions
- Author's note - this was supposedly a joke, according to sessions
These and other comments attributed to sessions, which were integral in his rejection as a Federal Judge, can be read in an article in the Washington Post. The article is very even handed and includes jeff sessions' explanations to these comments and his description of their veracity. see the following link:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2016/12/02/jeff-sessionss-comments-on-race-for-the-record/?utm_term=.dda38e88c844
Another valuable link in reference to sessions' history, including the failed judicial nomination is at:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Sessions#Failed_nomination_to_the_district_court
On June 5, 1986, the Committee voted 10–8 against recommending the nomination to the Senate floor, with Republican Senators Charles Mathias of Marylandand Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania voting with the Democrats. It then split 9–9 on a vote to send Sessions' nomination to the Senate floor with no recommendation, this time with Specter in support. A majority was required for the nomination to proceed.[33] The pivotal votes against Sessions came from his home state's Democratic Senator Howell Heflin of Alabama. Although Heflin had previously backed Sessions, he began to oppose Sessions after hearing testimony, concluding that there were "reasonable doubts" over Sessions' ability to be "fair and impartial." The nomination was withdrawn on July 31, 1986.[21]
Moving along in sessions time line, it is 1994. sessions is now the Attorney General (AG) for the state of Alabama. he was AG for only two years before running for and becoming a Senator for Alabama in the U.S. Senate. In those two years, one of the most telling actions on his part was his fight to preserve Alabama's so called 'separate and unequal' education law.
After the landmark Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka case in 1954, the state of Alabama passed an amendment to the State's Constitution, to stop school funding on a statewide level. School districts were left to fend for themselves financially, with the obvious and intended consequence that schools in rich areas (white of course) would be well funded and schools in poor regions of the state (black of course) would be poorly funded. Thus the State of Alabama would lay waist to the most vulnerable citizens, poor black children.
The ACLU (American Civil liberties Union) brought a case to the Alabama court system challenging this amendment. After three years (the case started prior to sessions becoming the State AG) Judge Eugene W. Reese, of the Alabama Circuit Court found the law to be illegal. sessions led the battle against the decision, claiming that Reese had overreached his authority.
In 1997 (after sessions was no longer the state AG) the Alabama Supreme Court upheld Judge Reese's finding that the state's educational inequality was unconstitutional. For a more thorough read on this episode, see:
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/21/opinion/jeff-sessions-other-civil-rights-problem.html?_r=0
Now we come to just last year, 2015. This one is simple. sessions wrote and published what he titled Immigration Handbook for the New Republican Majority. The stated conclusion is as follows:
The immigration debate can be reduced to three essential questions:
- Is America a sovereign nation that has the right to control its borders and decide who comes to live and work here?
- Should American immigration laws serve the just interests of the country and its citizens?
- And do those citizens have the right to expect and demand that the laws passed by their elected representatives be enforced?
If we believe the answers to these questions are “yes,” then we have no choice but to fight—and to win. Why were we elected, if not to serve the people who sent us here?
The full text can be read at:
https://www.sessions.senate.gov/public/_cache/files/67ae7163-6616-4023-a5c4-534c53e6fc26/immigration-primer-for-the-114th-congress.pdf
My answer to mr. sessions is as follows, from the famous American poem, The New Colossus by Emma Lazarus in 1883 :
"Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"
My answer to mr. sessions is as follows, from the famous American poem, The New Colossus by Emma Lazarus in 1883 :
"Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"
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