Roberts and Miers mired in ambiguity

You know what I'm going to say.

That I would have loved to have stood there and beamed as John Roberts was sworn in as the new chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. But there's the little issue of my uterus — and those of millions of women — that made that impossible.

I just can't stand up for a man who won't clearly and unequivocally stand up for me, for my choice, for my life.

We don't know how Roberts, 50, really feels about Roe v. Wade.

Throughout the nomination process, he laughed. He smiled. But we never heard him say whether he would preserve the long-standing decision legalizing abortion.

It is a mystery, an unknown, that worries me to my core.

So what do we know?

That as a young lawyer in the Reagan White House, Roberts called a memorial service for aborted fetuses sponsored by the California Pro Life Medical Association "an entirely appropriate means of calling attention to the abortion tragedy."

That Roberts' wife, Jane, was for four years on the board of directors of Feminists for Life, a pro-life group that supports women — as long as they don't experience unwanted pregnancy and choose to abort.

Despite all this, Roberts was in.

And when Washington opened for business yesterday, there was Bush's nominee to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor: Harriet Miers, his former personal lawyer and longtime crony who has cleared brush at the Crawford ranch. Yee-haw.

But here's something else we know: Whatever our feelings about Roberts or Miers, they are where they are because of us. Bush won the election and is free to do whatever he wants. We made it so.

Democrats hemmed and hawed over whether John Kerry was charismatic, kept or Botoxed. Whether that boat in Vietnam was swift or a sham. Whether his Purple Hearts were just the right shade.

When Election Day came, we were still tilting our heads back and forth like we were picking out slipcovers rather than deciding the future of our civil rights.

So we voted for Kerry, or we voted for Bush, or we didn't vote at all.

This is what we got. Four more years, two empty seats, a man who knows when to keep his mouth shut and a woman who knows the president's personal business.

I am trying to be optimistic, and focus on the fact that Roberts apparently has a great legal mind. He won the votes of 22 Democrats — half the caucus — and all 55 Republicans.

Bush described him as having "a kind heart." I hope that means he has compassion for the tough spot women are in, walking the delicate line of motherhood and womanhood.

We'll know for sure in the next session when the high court is set to consider two cases related to women's reproductive rights.

As much as I want to warm my hands in the glow of a freshly minted justice, and a woman being invited into a room that not long ago she would have never seen — I have to wring them instead.

Nicole Brodeur's column appears Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. Reach her at 206-464-2334 or nbrodeur@seattletimes.com. New Jack City, indeed.