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U.S. Senate Approves Controversial Ashcroft As Attorney General
WASHINGTON, Feb 1 (News Agencies) - The U.S. Senate, though deeply divided over President George W. Bush's most controversial cabinet nomination, confirmed John Ashcroft Thursday as attorney general.
Ashcroft, a former Republican senator and Missouri governor popular with conservatives for his firm stands against abortion and gun control, crashed into opposition from many Democrats who doubt his commitment to civil rights.
"Senator Ashcroft, I believe, is the wrong man to heal America's divisions," said Senator Tim Johnson, a South Dakota Democrat, ahead of the 58-to-42 vote.
Eight Democrats joined all 50 Republicans in supporting the nomination after two days of impassioned debate.
"He is as qualified as probably anybody has ever been to be attorney general. I am bothered by the intensity of opposition, and I wonder where it comes from," said assistant majority leader Don Nickles, an Oklahoma Republican.
With the Senate split 50-50 on party lines, Ashcroft was Bush's only nominee whose confirmation faced a vocal threat and an uncertain fate.
But on Tuesday the 18-member Senate Judiciary Committee voted in his favor, with one Democrat, Russ Feingold of Wisconsin, crossing the aisle.
"As a man who respects the rule of law, I have no doubt that he will enforce the laws of the land, rather than creatively interpret them," said Richard Shelby, an Alabama Republican, charging that was what liberals wanted from the top U.S. law enforcement officer.
Since his nomination last month, Ashcroft, who also has served as Missouri's attorney general, was in the cross hairs of an energetic campaign by liberal groups determined to derail his nomination.
Opponents maintained Ashcroft's conservative Christian religious beliefs could impair his willingness to enforce some U.S. laws, while supporters insisted he would enforce the law to the letter as he has pledged.
Former U.S. ambassador to Luxembourg James Hormel has accused Ashcroft, as a senator, of having opposed his nomination because he was gay, a charge Ashcroft denied.
Ashcroft, 58, stunned Democrats last year by leading a campaign to derail the nomination of black Missouri Supreme Court Justice Ronnie White to the federal bench.
He also raised liberal eyebrows in 1999, when he accepted an honorary degree from South Carolina's Bob Jones University, an institution that until recently banned interracial dating.
Iowa Democrat Tom Harkin said Ashcroft "even wrote legislation to criminalize abortion even in the cases of rape and incest ... No one can simply switch off after decades of hostility to reproductive rights, intolerance for homosexuality, and other non mainstream views."
Senator Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts noted a long record of opposition to legal abortion saying Ashcroft "even tried to prevent Missouri nurses form providing basic family planning services."
"Will Senator Ashcroft enforce the law fairly and vigorously? I believe that he cannot do so," Kennedy said.
"I hope that we will not have to go through similar battles when Supreme Court nominations come before us" in the Senate, remarked New York Democrat Charles Schumer, in a not-so-veiled warning to the White House.
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