The Mishandling of Lani Guinier : White House bails out on yet another nominee

What’s going on in the White House?

No President is, of course, obligated to stick with a nominee if he decides he can no longer support that person. But a disturbing pattern that points to sloppy Clinton Administration preparation has emerged. If President Clinton and his staff did not know all that they should know about their nominee for assistant attorney general for civil rights, then why was Lani Guinier nominated at all? It’s the sort of question Clinton has been asked before, about other doomed nominations.

Clinton admitted after withdrawing the nomination that he hadn’t read Guinier’s controversial writings. He said he would not have nominated her had he read her legal theories because he couldn’t defend her positions. Well, maybe. The President has the right to change his mind. But he should have been better informed before he made up his mind in the first place. Where was his staff? The President should have avoided this embarrassment.

Guinier, a law professor at the University of Pennsylvania, litigated voting rights cases for the NAACP Legal Defense Fund for more than seven years. She was the assistant to the respected Drew Days, who held the civil-rights post in the Justice Department during the Carter Administration. However, she has created quite a controversial paper trail.

Her academic articles on voting rights propose to promote fuller participation for minorities in a democracy. Conservatives and Jewish groups have interpreted her views as providing special protections for minorities. Critics have labeled her a “quota queen.”

When the name-calling began, the President should have rushed to her defense or quickly cut her loose. His procrastination prolonged the controversy, and signaled a weakness in his White House.

Did Clinton have no backbone, no stomach for a fight? Did he cave to political pressures? Did the White House staff fail to do adequate advance work? Did he learn nothing from previous problems with attorney general nominee Zoe Baird and almost-nominee Kimba Wood?

While the attacks mounted, Guinier was kept mum by the White House. Finally, she was allowed to explain herself Wednesday on the ABC program “Nightline.” She said then that she doesn’t believe in quotas. But she does believe in, say, a more diverse federal bench that looks more like America--the exact claim that President Clinton makes for his Cabinet.

With his mishandling of Lani Guinier, President Clinton has encouraged exactly what he says he didn’t want: a divisive national debate over the issue of race.