Tom Harkin: “A lot of the work we did is being termed irrelevant. Somehow, according to Mr. Sutton, we did not do enough. You may be…”

“A lot of the work we did is being termed irrelevant. Somehow, according to Mr. Sutton, we did not do enough. You may be wondering why I go into all of this. Mr. Sutton says we didn't have the findings, basically. When I look back on the Supreme Court decisions handed down in the last few years, I am troubled that a lot of the work we have done on civil rights over the last 30 years is in jeopardy. In particular, I see a chipping away of the Americans with Disabilities Act, the bill that symbolizes the inclusion of people in our society. Mr. Sutton has held the hammer and the chisel. That is why I am convinced Mr. Sutton does not possess all of the qualities needed to serve a life tenure on the Sixth Circuit. I am not convinced that someone with a civil rights claim could walk in the courtroom and be confident they will get a fair shake. It is not the person himself that troubles me. It is his ideology. It is where he is coming from. It is what he has said and written and advocated. He has advocated for the proposition that civil rights protections for persons with disabilities belongs in the hands of each of the 50 separate States. His arguments before the Supreme Court articulate that States can do a better job of it than Congress and that we did not find enough evidence. We found the evidence, and it is there in the record. I don't know how anyone in the real world could say: Disability discrimination in a constitutional sense is really difficult to show.…”