[JURIST] Two days after his nomination to the Supreme Court [JURIST report] by US President Bush, John Roberts made progress Thursday towards his goal of Senate confirmation when he received a rating of "non-activist judge" from moderate Republican Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Arlen Specter [official website]. Roberts has yet to receive public opposition from a single Senate Democrat and Wednesday Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) [official website] said Roberts did not meet the definition of "extraordinary circumstances" that would justify a filibuster under a compromise worked out by 14 senators earlier this spring to avert the so-called "nuclear option [Wikipedia backgrounder]." But on his second day of courtesy calls Roberts also met with Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-MA) [official website] and Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY) [official website], two of the three Democrats who opposed his nomination to the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit two years earlier. Schumer gave Roberts a list of questions, some dealing with abortion, and told him to "be prepared to answer them in the best way he can" when the hearings commence. AP has more.