Following President George W. Bush’s recent nomination of Judge Samuel A. Alito to the U.S. Supreme Court, many have raised concerns about the future of the nation’s highest court.

In a UCSD lecture on Nov. 3, Brandeis University law professor Anita Hill addressed her concerns about the Supreme Court and how gender has played an important role in the nominations.

In 1991, Hill came forward during the confirmation hearings for then-Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas, accusing him of sexual harassment. Despite her claims, the Senate narrowly confirmed Thomas.

“In the last four years, we’ve really come to understand the importance of the Supreme Court and its relationship to the president,” Hill said. “We need to be looking for a court that is not going to be rubberstamping the political agenda of the majority party in the United States Congress or in the president’s office.”

Hill also expressed her uncertainty with the president’s latest nomination. She said that the possible pairing of Chief Justice John Roberts and Alito as the newest additions to the existing court could impact specific gender and civil rights issues, including the role of federal law, which mandates gender equality in school sports and reproductive rights.

“Judge Alito and Roberts are conservatives, and they will follow a philosophy that will protect the president’s authority and that will limit congressional authority to extend individual rights,” Hill said.

In light of the recent nominations, Hill also spoke about the recent questions regarding the qualifications of Supreme Court justices. Because there are no official guidelines to measure credibility, a nominee’s credentials can become important. Hill said that criticism of Bush’s initial nomination of White House counsel Harriet Miers, which eventually led to her withdrawing, was essentially driven by sexism and elitism.

“Many of her critics said that [Miers] lacked intellectual heft to deal with the issues of constitutional law that are likely to come before the court,” Hill said. “In terms of intellectual heft, those are the kinds of questions that are raised very often when you have a woman candidate or a candidate of color.”

Even the way Miers was presented to the public was very different from the president’s presentation of Roberts and Alito, according to Hill. Hill said that while the president talked about the long list of credentials the other two had during his nomination announcements, Miers was only described as having served the president for the past five years as his chief counsel.

“In that sense, he constricted her entire career in the [past] five years,” Hill said. “This reflects the president’s very narrow view of what qualifications are, as well as a very narrow view of what women’s and minorities’ qualifications should be.”

Those who attended the lecture said that Hill brought up aspects of the nomination process that they had never thought about.

“I thought that she was absolutely right in [pointing out] the way Miers was brought forth as opposed to the other candidates,” said Shaun Couglin, a graduate student at the School for International Relations and Pacific Studies. “It looked to me like it was more of a question of her judicial experience, whereas professor Hill drew on a gender basis.”

The gender issue was a important topic to cover, according to Emelyn De La Pena, director of the Women’s Center.

“I was really glad she pointed out a few of the things people don’t think about [regarding] the nomination process,” she said. “Women are overlooked not only for reasons that are obvious but also because they might not have had the same opportunities that some men had.”

Because it is up to individual senators to define what makes a good Supreme Court justice, they are more likely to look at a nominee’s ideology as a “litmus test,” Hill said.

Judicial philosophies, whether they will have a more strict interpretation of the constitution or be judicial “activists,” will play an important role in the confirmation process, Hill said.

“The judicial activists have been made the enemy, but only the judicial activists that act in areas that extend rights,” Hill said.

Thurgood Marshall College freshman Mark Galvan said that Hill’s lecture gave him a new view of the judicial system.

“It was interesting to see other perspectives to give me an understanding of how the world works and how American politics are shaped around issues like gender,” Galvan said.

Other students who attended the lecture agreed that Hill’s gender analysis was an important one.

“I thought it was interesting how she was able to connect through political lines, through gender, to analyze why Miers was treated the way she was,” Eleanor Roosevelt College senior Shannon Davenport said. “[Hill’s] points are valid. That language is important, and we do have to pay more attention to how language is used to promote certain ideas.”

The event was sponsored by the Women’s Center as part of a series of activities to celebrate its 10-year anniversary. Approximately 900 administrators, students and community members attended.