A LOOK AT POSSIBLE SUPREME COURT CANDIDATES : Jose A. Cabranes

Conservative Democrat

U.S. district judge

Colleagues say that U.S. District Judge Jose A. Cabranes, the first Puerto Rican jurist appointed to a mainland federal court, is both an intellectual and a pragmatist.

Since President Jimmy Carter appointed him to the federal bench in Connecticut in 1979, Cabranes has become known as a well-respected, conservative Democrat who takes particular interest in constitutional issues. Attorneys who have worked in his courtroom describe the 50-year-old jurist as a man who speaks his mind.

“He is decisive, smart, and there are very few members of the (Connecticut) bar who would not consider him a good appointment,” said Susan W. Wollfson, president of the Connecticut Bar Assn.

Colleagues in New Haven declined to speculate about Cabranes’ position on the “litmus test” issue of abortion, noting that he apparently has never tried an abortion-related case and has not expressed a personal opinion on the subject.

Cabranes has authored numerous decisions on constitutional issues, but none of his opinions are regarded as a landmark decision.

In 1983, he rejected a defendant’s claim that a compulsive gambling habit led him to steal, but he also overruled a U.S. attorney’s request that the insanity defense be abolished. He has ruled that the Immigration and Naturalization Service has the right to deny parole requests by illegal aliens, and he has twice moved to protect the secrecy of grand jury proceedings.

Cabranes, born in Mayaguez, Puerto Rico, earned a bachelor’s degree from Columbia University, a law degree from Yale University and a master’s degree in international law from the University of Cambridge in Britain.

Cabranes practiced at the New York law firm of Casey, Lane & Mittendorf until he became an associate professor of law at Rutgers University. From 1973 to 1975, he worked in Washington as an attorney in the office of the governor of Puerto Rico. From 1975 until his appointment to the federal bench in 1979, Cabranes worked as Yale University’s general counsel.

A father of three, Cabranes is married to Yale Law School associate professor Kate Stith.