Alito held over as confirmation hearings enter fourth day News
Alito held over as confirmation hearings enter fourth day

[JURIST] Members of the US Senate Judiciary Committee [official website] will continue their questioning of Supreme Court nominee Judge Samuel Alito [official profile; JURIST news archive] into the fourth day of his confirmation hearings Thursday following Wednesday testimony dominated by questions concerning abortion and Alito's membership in a controversial Princeton alumni association. Alito was pressed on his refusal to disavow a 1985 memo where he wrote "the Constitution does not protect a right to an abortion." Alito did not comment on how he would rule on abortion cases, and though he has refused to call Roe v. Wade "settled law" as Chief Justice John Roberts did during his confirmation hearings in September, Alito has promised to view the issue with an "open mind" [JURIST report]. Alito claimed to have no recollection of involvement with the Concerned Alumni of Princeton (CAP) [Wikipedia backgrounder], a group which previously voiced its opposition to admitting additional women and minorities to the university, even though he listed CAP as a reference on a 1985 job application with the Reagan Administration. He nonetheless denounced as offensive an article written by CAP in 1983 which stated, "People nowadays just don't seem to know their place. Everywhere one turns, blacks and Hispanics are demanding jobs simply because they're black and Hispanic…Homosexuals are demanding the government vouchsafe them the right to bear children…And now come women." At the request of Senator Edward Kennedy (D-MA) [official website; press release on Alito and CAP], members of the Senate Judiciary Committee will be seeking records and press coverage of the group from the Library of Congress [official website]. The Washington Post has more. VOA has additional coverage.

ALSO ON JURIST

 Op-ed: Alito Day 3: Drama Over CAP | Op-ed: Alito Day 3: Effective Equanimity

THIS DAY @ LAW

UN General Assembly approves Palestine partition plan

The UN General Assembly approved UN Resolution Resolution 181 (II) on November 29, 1947, recommending that the British Mandate for Palestine be split into a Jewish state, an Arab state, and an international zone for Jerusalem. The vote in the assembly was 33 for to 13 against, with 10 abstentions. The resolution sparked a war between Palestinian Arabs and Jews in 1947 and a wider war after Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Iraq, and Lebanon invaded the new State of Israel in 1948. Read Resolution 181 (II).

UN divided Palestine between Arabs and Jews

On November 29, 1947, the UN General Assembly voted to partition Palestine into Jewish and Arab territories, leading to the establishment of a Jewish state the following year. Read UN General Assembly Resolution 181.

Defense Secretary Robert McNamara resigns during Vietnam Conflict

On November 29, 1967, Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara announced that he was resigning from his office to accept an appointment as head of the World Bank. The announcement came as the Vietnam Conflict was becoming increasingly unpopular in the United States and abroad.