Senate Tender On Tinder

The Senate Judiciary Committee treated Judge John Tinder with kid gloves today during his confirmation hearing for an appointment to the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals. "The Indianapolis native's confirmation hearing was uncontentious and short, a contrast to the lengthy battles the president and Senate Democrats have had over some of the president's judicial nominees," writes the Star's Maureen Groppe. "Tinder received bipartisan backing from Indiana's senators, Republican Richard Lugar and Democrat Evan Bayh," she adds. Sen. Dick Durbin was the only panel member to ask tough questions of him. Groppe writes:

But Durbin did ask Tinder about a racial discrimination case Tinder dismissed that was later reversed on appeal. Tinder said he made a mistake in ruling that there was not enough evidence for the suit to go forward.

"I was incorrect," he said.

Pointing out that Tinder has been reversed on some of the cases in which he has ruled against an employee, prison inmate or criminal defendant but never when he ruled in favor of them, Durbin asked whether that record suggests any tendencies.

"I try to look at each case on its own merits and don't approach any case with a predisposition on how it should come out," Tinder said, adding that he's handled thousands of cases and been reversed on few.

Asked what about his background would give a poor person hope that he would be treated fairly in Tinder's courtroom, Tinder noted that when he served as a public defender, he worked with criminal defendants, many of them indigent.

"I've been in their jail cells talking to them, waiting for the juries," he said. "I've been in their homes, investigating their cases, talking with their families. ... I've been there so that should give them some comfort."