Bork Assails Liberals for Court Defeat

Former Federal Judge Robert H. Bork on Friday night continued his onslaught against liberal opponents and the process that blocked his elevation to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Comparing himself to Gen. George Armstrong Custer at the battle of the Little Big Horn, Bork pounded away at the theme that his defeat was “the first national election campaign” over a judicial seat and a “campaign for control of our legal culture.”

Bork, whose nomination to the high court was defeated by a Senate vote of 58 to 42 on Oct. 23, made the remarks in a speech before the American Bar Assn.’s litigation section.

The conservative jurist, who left the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia last week, said in his letter of resignation to President Reagan that he wanted to leave the bench so that he could speak out without restraint on the process by which Supreme Court nominees are reviewed by the Senate.

He joined the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research in Washington on Monday, using the conservative think tank as a base for speaking and for writing a book about his experience.

The Friday night speech was Bork’s first on the West Coast since his failed Supreme Court bid and the fifth public appearance since leaving the appellate bench.

No Fee for Speech

A spokesman for the ABA said Bork charged nothing for Friday night’s speech, because it was booked months ago while he was still on the bench. Bork now plans to embark on the lecture circuit charging high fees for such appearances.

Bork assured reporters at a news conference last Monday at American Enterprise Institute headquarters that he was “not angry” about his defeat and that he had no intention of trying to convince the country that he should have been confirmed.

But his subsequent speeches have sounded very angry.

He has repeatedly criticized Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) for using his contacts with organized labor and Southern blacks to mobilize liberals against him.

“Even for a political campaign,” Bork told the 250 lawyers and guests, as he had told previous audiences, Kennedy’s behavior “set record lows in mendacity, brutality and intellectual vulgarity.”

Among the Kennedy comments that Bork said he took exception to was a description of “Robert Bork’s America,” as “a nightmare of fascist repression.”

Defends Civil Rights

But what angered him most, Bork told the ABA group, was that Kennedy marshaled Southern blacks against him because of his rulings on civil rights.

“I won’t take time to spell out my civil rights record as solicitor general and as a judge, but it is a very good one,” Bork said. “That fact was obscured and millions of black Americans were told that I was their enemy. The claim that I am hostile to black civil rights was a lie,” Bork said.

Politicizing the Supreme Court nominating process, Bork said, could taint the judiciary by tempting judges aspiring to the Supreme Court to “vote and write the most politically popular way.”

Bork urged the lawyers to join him in a “political and intellectual struggle” to preserve an independent judicial branch of government.