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This week the Senate Judiciary Committee will convene formal hearings on Judge Roberts' nomination to the United States Supreme Court. Unfortunately, partisans are organizing in the Senate and in the news media to see to it that Judge Roberts is pressed to reveal his views on the policy and legal issues of the day.

But if history is a guide Chairman Specter and the rest of the committee should agree that no one should try to force Judge Roberts to prejudge cases or offer advance rulings on cases likely to come before him on the Supreme Court.

As far back as 1864 this principle was acknowledged by President Lincoln when he said of his nominee to the Supreme Court, Salmon P. Chase, "We can not ask a man what he will do, and if we should, and he should answer us, we should despise him for it."

Although it is well settled that judges must not give forecasts of the rulings they would make if they were appointed, some are trying to pretend that either such a principle doesn't exist, or if it does it should be discarded.

What's at stake here? It's the authority and prestige of the court as a neutral arbiter of the law. And if the senators are unable to restrain themselves, Judge Roberts must refuse to go along.

But we don't have to go back 100 years to find evidence of this practice. As recently as Thurgood Marshall's nomination to the Supreme Court in 1967, we see it. Even under the threat of a filibuster by pro-segregation Democrats, Marshall refused to give any hints as to how he'd rule saying repeatedly "My difficulty is that, from all of the hearings I have ever read about, it has been considered and recognized as improper for a nominee to a judgeship to comment on cases that he will have to pass on." And the then junior senator from Massachusetts, Ted Kennedy sided with him vigorously reminding his colleagues that Marshall like other judges should not have to answer questions regarding how he'd rule.

Furthermore, the American Bar Association's Model Code of Judicial Conduct now enshrines this practice as one of its canons reminding judges that they "shall not with respect to cases, controversies, or issues that are likely to come before the court, make pledges, promises, or commitments that are inconsistent with the impartial performance of the adjudicative duties of the office."

And just over a decade ago when another DC Circuit Court of Appeals judge was nominated to the United States Supreme Court we saw it again. That judge, now Justice Ruth Ginsburg was faced with circumstances similar to Judge Roberts. Like Judge Roberts, prior to joining the Court of Appeals, Judge Ginsburg had a fairly prominent public career. In her case it included serving as the general counsel to one of the nation's most influential leftist organizations, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).

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