WSJ Law Blog (and lots of other sites) When we talk about inclusion and exclusion in the legal profession, we invariably end up asking about the role of merit — and how to gauge merit — in the process of admitting students to law school, offering jobs to applicants, and appointing people to elite positions. President Obama’s recent picks for the federal judiciary have set all time marks for diversity in terms of women and non-whites. At the same time, a recently broken news story — who leaked this info and for what purpose? — suggests that the ABA’s vetting committee for judicial nominations has delivered “unqualified” ratings to a number of possible candidates floated by the Obama administration, and that the “unqualified” ratings have disproportionately hit women and non-whites. There have been hints that some of the unqualified ratings may be explained by a lack of trial experience.
[Despite what it says below, this was posted by John Steele.]