Senate Confirms Bonner U.S. Judge, Elevates 2 Jurists

The Senate on Thursday confirmed Los Angeles U.S. Atty. Robert C. Bonner as a federal judge and two Los Angeles federal jurists as members of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

All three were first nominated by former President Ronald Reagan and resubmitted by President Bush in February after the Senate’s Democratic majority decided to delay acting on most federal judgeship vacancies until after the election.

The District Court judges elevated to the appeals court were Pamela Ann Rymer and Ferdinand F. Fernandez. Bonner was confirmed to fill Rymer’s seat on the District Court.

Rymer, 48, has served on the federal bench in Los Angeles since 1983. Reagan nominated her last year to the 9th Circuit seat vacated when Anthony M. Kennedy was appointed to the Supreme Court. A highly regarded, generally conservative judge, she was among those considered for the high court nomination that eventually went to Kennedy.

Fernandez, 51, was nominated by Reagan after his first choice, San Diego law professor Bernard H. Siegan, was rejected by the Senate Judiciary Committee last June. Before being named to the federal bench, Fernandez was a Superior Court judge in San Bernardino from 1980 to 1985.

Bonner, 47, has been the chief federal prosecutor in Los Angeles since 1984.

In contrast to the swift Senate action on Bush’s nomination of the three judges, the Senate Judiciary Committee has not yet scheduled a hearing for San Francisco attorney Vaughn R. Walker, another nominee first submitted by Reagan for a federal judgeship in Northern California.

Walker, backed by Sen. Pete Wilson (R-Calif.), is strongly opposed by Sen. Alan Cranston (D-Calif.) and gay rights activists. Cranston said that he plans to fight against confirmation, although the practice of automatically withdrawing a nomination opposed by a home state senator no longer is being followed, according to a Cranston aide.

Legal Battle

The controversy over Walker involves actions that the 44-year-old attorney took several years ago during a legal battle between the U.S. Olympic Committee, a client of Walker’s, and the San Francisco-based Gay Olympics. The Olympic Committee sued successfully to block the gay group from using the Olympic name. The committee then won a court order directing the gay organization to pay some of the committee’s attorney fees.