SENATE CONFIRMS HIM BY 52-48

The Senate concluded one of the most bitter and angry debates in its history Tuesday by voting 52-48 to confirm Clarence Thomas as the 106th justice to the U.S. Supreme Court. Thomas, a 43-year-old federal appeals court judge and Yale Law School graduate, will become the second black to serve on the high court. His confirmation is expected to solidify an already conservative majority. The debate and vote capped a week of national agony over charges that Thomas had sexually harassed Oklahoma law professor Anita F. Hill when she worked for him in the early 1980s.

The victory came after an emotional 107-day confirmation process that left Thomas with his reputation tarnished and his fury palpable. Hill’s reputation also came under extensive attack during the weekend hearings into her allegations.

After his confirmation, Thomas said it was time to put the debate behind him.

“This is more a time for healing, not a time for anger or for animus or animosity,” Thomas said.

“I guess in so many ways, as I say to my wife so many times, I’d like to thank America,” he said, standing beside his wife, Virginia, outside their house in Alexandria, Va.

President Bush called Thomas immediately after the vote to congratulate him, White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater said.

Hill, in Oklahoma, said she was satisfied that she had been “able to go out and tell what I knew true.” She also said she was pleased that national awareness of sexual harassment had been raised.

Connecticut’s two senators, Democrats Christopher J. Dodd and Joseph I. Lieberman, voted against Thomas. Lieberman was one of four Democratic supporters to switch. In all, Thomas won with the support of 41 Republicans and 11 Democrats.

The Senate vote was the second-closest margin of victory for a high court nominee. The closest vote was in 1881, when Stanley Matthews, nominated by President James Garfield, was confirmed 24-23. Thomas is the youngest justice since William O. Douglas, who

was 41 at the time of his confirmation in 1939.

The Senate chamber was hushed as Sen. Sam Nunn of Georgia, in a brief speech about 5:30 p.m., became the ninth Democrat to voice his support for Thomas, sealing the nominee’s victory. Vice President Dan Quayle was in the chair, ready to cast a tie-breaking vote if needed.

Shortly after Nunn’s speech, the Republicans declared victory for Thomas and decried the confirmation process.

“Many people could not have endured this. … We must get our act together,” said Sen. John C. Danforth, R-Mo., Thomas’ former employer and chief Senate backer. He was speaking of the often-agonizing confirmation process.

Thomas, Danforth said, “is going to be the people’s justice.” Thomas received the lowest rating by the American Bar Association of the past 23 nominees to the high court, said Majority Leader George J. Mitchell, D-Maine.

Thomas replaces the liberal Thurgood Marshall, a leading icon of the civil rights movement who was the first black justice on the high court.

Much of the day’s drama centered on the two Connecticut senators, whose late declarations helped keep the outcome in doubt until nearly the last moment.

Dodd spoke around 4 p.m., when the vote was about evenly split, but Lieberman kept his intentions secret, even missing the first roll call vote at 6 p.m. Lieberman told reporters he had finally decided to switch at 5:55 p.m.

Unlike Dodd, Lieberman did not speak on the floor. And by the time he made his intentions known, his vote had no effect on the outcome, thereby minimizing the animosity of Thomas’ backers while soothing Thomas’ opponents.

Explaining his opposition, Dodd said he thought Thomas might suffer a credibility problem while on the court and would have difficulty helping the court use its “power of moral persuasion,” which Dodd said was ultimately its only enforcement tool.

“After a weekend of hearings and reading hundreds of pages of material on this case, I have too many doubts as to who is telling the truth. . .” “And the fact is, I have far too many doubts about Judge Thomas to vote in favor of this confirmation. I am deeply concerned that placing a person on the court with a cloud over his head undermines the moral and persuasive authority of the court.” The Senate originally had been scheduled to vote on the Thomas nomination a week ago, but it delayed action to permit a fuller investigation of Hill’s complaints to the Senate Judiciary Committee that Thomas had sexually harassed her. She said he had repeatedly asked her for a date and referred to pornographic movies and his sexual prowess.

Several members of the committee had known of Hill’s charges before they were made public, but they had elected not to hold a public hearing or an in-depth investigation.

The allegations and debate have left the Senate questioning itself.

Democrats and Republicans were critical of the process. “No matter how these proceedings turn out, no joy is possible,” Danforth said. He said he would be relieved to have the lengthy debate come to an end.

“The process has become confused with electoral politics,” Mitchell said. “It must be changed.” Shortly after the debate began

in the morning, the Senate’s senior Democrat, Robert C. Byrd of West Virginia, took the floor. In his slow cadence, Byrd described his decision to oppose Thomas.

“I believe Anita Hill,” he told his colleagues in a nearly hourlong speech.

Thomas’ refusal to watch Hill’s testimony troubled Byrd greatly. He said it called into question Thomas’ judicial temperament, one of the qualities that senators assess when they are determining a nominee’s fitness for the high court.

“He shut his eyes and he closed his ears, and he closed his mind and he didn’t even bother to watch,” Byrd said.

Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass., whose own life has been plagued with allegations of indiscreet behavior with women, was one of the Democrats’ most eloquent orators during Tuesday’s debate.

He urged his colleagues to consider their votes carefully and then oppose Thomas.

“On a question of such vast and lasting significance, where the course of our future for years to come is riding on our decision, the Senate should give the benefit of the doubt to the Supreme Court and the Constitution, not to Judge Clarence Thomas. … To give the benefit of the doubt to Judge Thomas is to say that Judge Thomas is more important than the Supreme Court.” Leading Republican supporters of Thomas, such as Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah, gave impassioned defenses of Thomas and attacked Hill’s credibility, much as they had done during the protracted weekend hearings.

“Why didn’t Professor Hill suggest any concerns to her co-workers? … Why did she call him so many times?” Hatch asked.

Sen. Strom Thurmond, R-S.C., the ranking Republican on the judiciary committee, said he was “outraged and ashamed by the perversion of the process which has occurred, and I am profoundly saddened by the damage that has been done to a man of impeccable character. … If we are to salvage our constitutional role in this instance … we must strip away the hysteria which has surrounded this whole affair and return to the facts.” Associated Press reports were included in this story.