No Place to Hide. . . .
posted by Frank Pasquale
Since privacy is my theme today, here’s a nugget from the DOJ Hiring scandal report unearthed by Brian Leiter:
We found that Goodling’s Internet research on candidates for Department positions was extensive and designed to obtain their political and ideological affiliations. . . .[S]he had attended a seminar at the White House Office of Presidential Personnel and received a document entitled “The Thorough Process of Investigation.” The document described methods for screening candidates for political positions and recommended using www.tray.com and www.opensecrets.org to find information about contributions to political candidates and parties. The document also explained how to find voter registration information. In addition, the document explained how to conduct searches on www.nexis.com, and included an example of a search string that contained political terms such as “republican,” “Bush or Cheney,” “Karl Rove,” “Howard Dean,” “democrat!,” “liberal,” “abortion or pro-choice.” . . .
The key question now is: what’s the remedy? Is it only possible to right this wrong by balancing several years of rightward bias with several years of leftward bias? There is a real conundrum here: if the department merely reverts to neutrality after several years of bias, there’s little deterrent against this kind of conduct in the future. . . . though this diagram from Slate suggests that people other than the immunized Goodling may be in trouble here.
July 28, 2008 at 8:26 pm
Posted in: Politics
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Responses (9)
HLS Rising 3L - July 28, 2008 at 11:09 pm
There may be no remedy and the damage done by the Bush administration may be a true ratchet. There are now a significant number of conservative individuals who have high-level positions that they obtained through non-meritocratic means who will occupy those jobs for quite some time. Furthermore, there is a missing generation of moderate and liberal individuals who have not received these positions, have not received the requisite training and so on. Just as importantly, there will continue to be disincentives for highly qualified people to join the administration. As a liberal member of the Harvard Law Review who is likely in the top 10% of my class, I will not be applying to the DOJ honors program because I do not want to have these people as coworkers. I had always assumed that I’d apply for such a position but based on conversations with classmates, alums, and information I’ve gathered, I’ve changed my mind. The well has been poisoned and there’s little we can do. I would be equally uncomfortable with a political purge, which would reek of Stalinism. It is unfair to assume all Bush appointees are thus tainted, but there is no reasonable remedy. It is time to stop thinking of the DOJ as a prestigious place to work or a place staffed by competent public-minded individuals.
Joe Blow - July 29, 2008 at 12:12 am
Come off it. Does anyone really think that the career positions at DOJ are now disproportionately held by “conservatives”? If anything this practice has lead to a little more balance. HLS Rising 3L, you should still apply. You can rest assured that most of your career collegues will still be bleeding heart lefties.
Anon - July 29, 2008 at 10:20 am
Take a survey at DOJ. I’d be shocked if a majority of career employees aren’t Dems already. That’s generally true across government. There really isn’t a need for “left wing bias” beyond what already happens.
This is not an excuse for the political hirings which violated the law. But the idea that there is some imbalance now that needs to be remedied assumes there was a balance before this incident.
A.J. Sutter - July 29, 2008 at 11:00 am
Most people writing on this blog who think Democrats are “left-wing” were born when? In the Reagan era? In the Carter era, even? If so, you have no understanding of what left-wing is. Democrats ain’t it.
HLS Rising 3L - July 29, 2008 at 11:10 am
I think the two responses miss part of the problem. Regardless of the previous ideology of past hires, they weren’t hacks. Goodling and company went way outside of mainstream hiring practices to put in place people who are actively unqualified for the job and who will seek to undermine any potential reform of the damages they’ve created. These aren’t just conservative hires or just unintelligent conservative hires, but they are a cancer upon the government. Look to NASA and shudder.
A.J. Sutter - July 29, 2008 at 8:57 pm
HLSR3L, I understand your point. But surely there must be some part of the executive branch that’s immune from such practices. Say, like DHS. Or, since you’re on HLR, how about reviewing speeches and other presentations by scientists on the government dole?
merevaudevillian - July 30, 2008 at 9:45 am
I wonder what the “rise of the Internet” has done for this. As in, before 2001, there wasn’t much Web research to be done, or at least not on individual candidates. Post-2001, there’s been plenty, but it leaves a “smoking gun” trail. If anything, it appears that, if the DOJ has always, albeit “tacitly,” engaged in politically-discriminatory hiring, it might be the case that the Bush administration takes the fall: previous administrations never had a Web trail, and future administrations will learn from this exposure.
Orin Kerr - July 30, 2008 at 8:45 pm
HLS Rising 3L ,
DOJ is still very liberal, actually. Een the hiring by the Bush DOJ was very liberal, something like a ratio of 3 to 1. So there are still relatively few conservatives at DOJ, and you don’t have to worry about working with conservatives if you go there.
HLS Rising 3L - July 31, 2008 at 11:26 am
Professor Kerr, I think you and others are missing the point. This isn’t about liberal vs/ conservative, but about the solidification through non-meritocratic processes of a particular view of the role of government. It’s not that I don’t want to work with partisans it’s that I don’t want to work with partisan hacks. Rachel Brand is an outstanding example of the former and I would gladly work with her. Monica Goodling is just one of dozens of the latter. Bad money drives out good and this administration has placed enough of these people that it’s not surprising that this is happening.
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