WHEN LYNDON JOHNSON made the historic appointment of Thurgood Marshall to the Supreme Court in 1967, all was not sweetness and light. The honorable gentleman who had formerly served as Kleagle of the Ku Klux Klan–West Virginia’s Robert Byrd–believed that Marshall was too liberal and asked FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover to look into Marshall’s possible Communist connections. Senator Edward Kennedy chided Byrd and other Southern senators who opposed Marshall’s nomination, instructing them on the appropriate criteria to use in evaluating the nomination. According to Kennedy, only the nominee’s “background, experience, qualifications, temperament, and integrity” were to be considered.

Today, of course, Senator Byrd opposes President Bush’s nomination of California Supreme Court Justice Janice Rogers Brown to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals on the ground that she is too conservative, as he had earlier opposed Clarence Thomas’s confirmation to the Supreme Court. Byrd holds the distinction of being the only senator to have voted against both black nominees to the United States Supreme Court. And Senator Kennedy opposes Brown’s nomination for reasons having mostly to do with her political views. It’s difficult to take either Byrd or Kennedy seriously. We look to them rather as a significant part of the Senate’s ongoing contribution to the human comedy. Those seeking insight into the qualifications of Justice Brown for high office must look elsewhere.