THE DISAPPOINTMENT many conservatives feel over the nomination of Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court will not vanish unless and until Miers begins writing solid conservative Supreme Court opinions. In the absence of such opinions, there is little reason to believe that the Miers nomination fulfills President Bush’s stated desire to nominate Justices in the mold of Scalia and Thomas. In fact, we cannot even be highly confident that Bush has nominated a reliably conservative vote, as opposed a swing vote in the O’Connor or Kennedy style.

Some dispute the latter proposition. They argue that Bush is in the best position to know what kind of Justice Miers will be, so that if he assures us that Miers is a judicial conservative, we have no reason to doubt his word.