Nixon Chooses a Segregationist Judge: The Rehnquist Choice; The Untold Story of the Nixon Appointment That Redefined the Supreme Court

At an early meeting to discuss potential nominees, [Richard Nixon] made clear his ideological priorities. Addressing the civil tights issue with his top deputies H.R. Haldeman and John Erlichman, Nixon emphasized, "Basically, I don't want a man on the Court that's a racist... We've crossed that God damn bridge. [But] I'm not going to put anybody in that thing that doesn't share my views on busing, period." To Nixon, such actions were not a reflection of racism but of political necessity for a Virginian. As Nixon explained to Attorney General John Mitchell, [Richard Poff] "did what any damn southerner should do. I'd sign the damn manifesto today." Accordingly, he didn't consider Poff's political choices to be disqualifying as long as he could credibly distinguish himself from what Nixon viewed as a harder core of southern racists. In this regard, Nixon's judicial selection process was an extension of the "southern strategy" he had used to get elected president. While Nixon did not embrace the far right extreme of southern politics, he knew that courting southern votes -- and his insistence on picking at least one southerner for the Court was just that -- meant accepting a history of resistance to desegregation. Moreover, such views were easily reconciled with Nixon's own antipathy to any civil rights remedy, such as busing, that involved involuntary mixing of the races.