New High Court Justice Sworn In : Law: State commission unanimously confirms Kathryn Werdegar, who declines to state her views on the death penalty.

Kathryn M. Werdegar, an independent conservative and an old friend of Gov. Pete Wilson, was sworn in Friday as a member of the California Supreme Court after a state commission unanimously confirmed her.

The appointment of Werdegar, 58, gives the court two female justices for the first time. A state Court of Appeal justice for three years, Werdegar is viewed as generally conservative but likely to take more moderate positions on occasion than the other four conservatives on the seven-member high court.

She declined to state her views on the death penalty during the one-hour hearing, even after a commissioner pressed her to say she would uphold the capital punishment law despite any personal opposition.

“I don’t anticipate any difficulty” in abiding by the law, she said.

As a former research attorney to retired conservative Justice Edward Panelli, whom she is replacing, Werdegar helped write opinions upholding death sentences.

But Sacramento Court of Appeal Justice Robert Puglia, one of the three members of the Commission on Judicial Appointments, asked her repeatedly if she would continue to support capital punishment even if she had a “personal epiphany.”

Assuming that the Constitution has been clearly interpreted, she replied, she could not envision such a scenario because “our role and duty is to follow the Constitution.”

Wilson swore her in, recalling their days as classmates at UC Berkeley’s Boalt Hall law school, where Werdegar was one of four women in a class of 350.

“Everybody wanted to carry Kay’s books,” Wilson remembered, until they saw her scores and decided instead to try “to look at her notes.”

Six witnesses, all of them supportive, testified about her nomination in the formal hearing room in San Francisco where the California Supreme Court meets for oral arguments.

UC Berkeley professor Jesse Choper argued that Werdegar’s lack of trial experience would not be a handicap on the high court. He noted that former U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justices John Marshall and Earl Warren were never trial judges, nor were some of the California court’s leading jurists.

Other witnesses described Werdegar as “disarmingly modest,” thoughtful, quietly confident and a devoted mother and wife.

Werdegar also worked for civil rights as a Justice Department attorney after graduating from George Washington University law school, to which she transferred from Boalt.

Judge Thelton E. Henderson, chief judge of the U.S. District Court for Northern California, testified that she helped formulate the government position to get the late Martin Luther King Jr. freed from a Birmingham, Ala., jail and advocated equal accommodations and equal voting rights for blacks.

As one of only two African Americans in his law school class, Henderson said, he and Werdegar shared many similar perceptions of the law school experience. Even though she graduated first in her class, law firms would not give her a job because she was a woman, he said.

A California bar commission rated Werdegar “well-qualified” for the high court, the middle of three ratings given to qualified candidates.

The only opposition Werdegar faced came in a letter to the appointments commission by a California association of criminal defense lawyers. The group said Werdegar’s appointment will perpetuate “single-mindedness on the court” because she probably will go along with its four conservative members who are “often referred to as clones.”

James S. Thomson, president of the California Attorneys for Criminal Justice, also said the group felt “great alarm” that Werdegar had drafted many of Panelli’s opinions upholding death sentences despite courtroom errors.

Wilson chose Werdegar in the face of strong pressure to name a minority or a woman to the high court in this election year. Justice Joyce Kennard, who is part Indonesian, is the only woman and minority now on the court. Wilson’s only other high court appointment, Justice Ronald George, a white man, replaced Justice Allen Broussard, who is African American.

Key Upcoming Cases

Here are several key cases that Kathryn Werdegar, the newest member of the California Supreme Court, is expected to participate in. Werdegar is considered more moderate than the court’s four other conservatives--Chief Justice Malcolm Lucas and Justices Ronald George, Armand Arabian and Marvin Baxter.

* Gays: Can cities pass ordinances to prohibit job discrimination against gays? Reviewing a San Francisco case, the court will decide whether such ordinances are preempted by state law. Supporters of the ordinances say they are necessary to ensure that victims can sue for harassment and recover attorney fees.

* Bias: Can private clubs in California discriminate? The case was brought by a woman who sued a San Mateo County country club that prohibits women and children from becoming full voting members. “Business establishments” in California are not allowed to discriminate, but a lower court ruled that the country club was “extremely private” and the woman had no grounds for a legal challenge. The state Supreme Court’s decision in this case could determine whether Boy Scouts of America can bar gays and atheists from membership.

* Hate: Are California’s hate-crime laws constitutional? The laws allow for stiffer punishment if attacks are motivated by bigotry against a victim’s race, color, ancestry, national origin, religion, disability or sexual orientation. The two cases before the court involve attacks on gay men in San Francisco and on Latinos in San Diego.

* Smoking: Can the use of the “Old Joe Camel” cigarette mascot in advertising be banned as an unfair business practice on the ground that it encourages minors to smoke? The plaintiffs allege that R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. is trying to target minors with the campaign.

* Insurance: Are state rules aimed at giving rebates to insurance customers constitutional? The case is a challenge to Proposition 103, the insurance reform initiative passed by voters in 1988. The court’s decision will help determine the authority of the state’s insurance commissioner to regulate rates.

* Homeless: How far can cities go in regulating the homeless? The court is reviewing the constitutionality of a Santa Ana ordinance that prohibits camping on public property.

* Affirmative action: Are local ordinances that require contractors to try to hire minority- and women-owned subcontractors constitutional? At issue is a Los Angeles law that a lower court held violated the equal protection clause of the Constitution.

Compiled by Times researcher Norma Kaufman