Silvia dutifully asked Judge Cartwright a technical question about the applicability of the commerce clause.
“Well, Senator,” Pepper said, “as you know, in the nineteen eighties the Court was divided and reversed itself on Garcia v. San Antonio Transit Authority…” Silvia nodded, as though thoroughly versed in the case, shooting a venomous glance in Dexter’s direction. Dexter for his part was thinking, I’ve seen episodes of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood that were more contentious. Why don’t you just ask her for her recipe for upside-down pineapple cake?
Silvia finished. “Thank you, Judge Cartwright. I have no further questions.”
And so, finally, it was Senator Dexter Mitchell’s turn. There had been much speculation about this moment. All eyes were on him. Normally he reveled in the sensation. Not today.
Even Terry, his wife, high school sweetheart, life’s companion, sharer of his heart’s secrets, lover, best friend, mother of their attractive children, had said to him that morning over the shredded mini-wheat, “I hope you’re not planning to embarrass yourself with Judge Cartwright.”
Planning? Planning? To be rendered splutteringly speechless, with a mouthful of shredded mini-wheat, on this day of days, by his own… wife? Yes, honey, he felt like saying, funny you should mention it. I was up all night “planning” how to make myself look like a complete fool on national television. Do you have any tips for me? How about if I blew my nose on Senator Tronkmeyer’s necktie? Do you think that would bring about the desired level of embarrassment? Or should I simultaneously summon a thermonuclear fart right as I’m boring in on her interpretation of the equal protection clause?
“I think she’s terrific,” Terry continued, not looking up from her newspaper.
“Thank you, honey,” Dexter said, “for the input.”
“Anytime,” Terry said, still not looking up.
“Judge Cartwright,” Dexter Mitchell began, leaning forward as he faced Pepper. There behind her was Graydon Clenndennynn, looking like a public library stone lion. There was the grandfather, Sheriff JJ, droopy mustache and all. His arms had been folded tightly across his chest for three days now as he scowled at the Judiciary Committee. Mess with my little girl, and I’ll cut out your livers. Next to him the Mexican woman. And there’s the Reverend Roscoe. Nice going with Ruby, there, Reverend… No, Dexter warned himself, don’t go there.
Dexter cleared his throat. “Judge Cartwright, were you… You must have been pretty surprised when President Vanderdamp nominated you for this job.”
“Is that a question, Senator, or a statement of the screamingly obvious?”
[Laughter.]
“Ha-ha,” Dexter nodded, “quite right. Yes, yes, I suppose you must have been. Because someone in your… position, that is, in your line of work, wouldn’t normally… I guess what I’m trying to get at-”
“Let me throw you a lifeline, Senator,” Pepper said. “The President’s telephone call knocked me flatter than butterfly roadkill. I stipulate that, Senator. But didn’t we kind of establish that about five minutes into these hearings?”
[Laughter.]
“Yes. Yes… Right you are, Judge.”
“It would take someone with bigger cojones than I have,” Pepper continued, giving Dexter a foxy look that only the two of them-along with the President, Graydon Clenndennynn, and Hayden Cork-could fully appreciate, “to ask for this. It’s not the sort of job anyone would solicit outright. Is it?”
This moment in the Cartwright hearings has been much discussed. Many have wondered why Senator Mitchell never paused to ask for a clarification of the meaning of “cojones.” Instead, he seemed to recoil slightly and stammer, “Judge, you’ve done, in my view, a-a-a very thorough, indeed, excellent job of answering this Committee’s questions.”
Pepper, staring evenly, said, “Very generous of you, sir.”
“There were those on the Committee,” Dexter said tsk-tskily, “who wanted to ask-to raise certain issues, going back… well, a long way.”
Pepper’s eyes narrowed.
“But it was decided that the Committee would not, so to speak, go there.”
Dexter Mitchell’s face suddenly and weirdly turned exuberantly magnanimous, like that of someone who has just decided to give away his entire fortune at the stroke of a pen.
“Yes,” he beamed. “And if I may say so myself, that was the right decision.”
His fellow Committee members stared at their chairman, jaws agape.
“As chair of this distinguished Committee, I feel strongly that no decent purpose would be accomplished by going there. No, no. And so, Judge, I am pleased-indeed, very pleased-to say, to declare right here and now, without further delay, that it is the collective sense of this Committee that your nomination is…”
Dexter let it hang there a moment, a little bright origami kite wafting on lung-warmed thermals.
“… likely, indeed almost certain to be approved by this Committee.”
A shiver of pleasure went through the room, and, through the airwaves, beyond into the land. For a moment, the entire country exhaled together, as a vast, happy ahhh spread from sea to shining sea, rippling the amber waves of grain as it went.
“Now,” Dexter said, looking abruptly serious, “this is not to say that I did not entertain certain…”
The ahhh paused, hovered tremulously over the Great Plains.
“… call them… if you might… well, misgivings…”
Amber waves of grain trembled.
Dexter spoke gravely, as if trying to look like a Daniel Chester French statue of himself. “I have, of course, certain responsibilities, transient and historical… but there are times-and this, surely, is one of them-when a leader, in order to lead, must follow. And so, let me be the first to say, as leader, that I will vote to approve your nomination.”
The room erupted into applause. The Committee members, most of whom were by now casting withering looks at their sure-to-be transient “leader,” began one by one to join in the applause.
CHAPTER 13
Pepper’s nomination was approved by the Senate Judiciary Committee 18-0 (one abstention) and 91-7 (two abstentions) by the full Senate.
Graydon Clenndennynn warmly accepted congratulations for his stewarding of the nomination, and dropped hints that it had been his idea all along. President Vanderdamp’s approval ratings shot up another few points. Complimented on his role, Hayden Cork mustered a tight smile and changed the subject.
Dexter Mitchell went on Greet the Press to assert manfully that there are times when “the courageous thing to do is to accept the will of the people and move on.” He quoted a leader of the 1848 Revolution in France, someone named Alexandre Ledru-Rollin, who had declared, completely sans irony, “There go the people. I must follow them. I am their leader.”
Though he put on a brave front, Dexter Mitchell felt inwardly humiliated. His fellow committee members now viewed him with outright loathing. There was murmuring (of high senatorial quality) in the cloakroom about the need for “fresh leadership.” Nights he lay awake grinding his molars after failing to satisfy his wife maritally. How, he wondered, had it come to this? Three decades of dutiful, steady, occasionally brilliant public service-to be outgunned and outshone by some chick TV judge from Texas. Where-Dexter Mitchell asked the ceiling gods-was the justice in that?
A few days later he took some satisfaction (however guilty) in reading in the Washington Post that Judge Cartwright’s marriage was apparently unraveling.
“Associate justice-designate Pepper Cartwright’s office today issued a statement announcing that she and her husband, producer Buddy Bixby, are ‘amicably separating’ after seven years of marriage.”
Fortunately, certain details did not make the paper.
Pepper had returned, triumphant, from Washington, eager to make up and move on with Buddy, only to find that her key no longer opened the door to their apartment. When she called him on her cell phone to ask what was going on, he informed her in a businesslike voice that she was no longer welcome.