As President Obama resubmitted the names of judges to the Senate for its advise and consent,  one name was missing from the list, Robert Chatigny, the Connecticut District Court judge up for the Second Circuit.  He had this to say:

An assistant who answered the telephone at Chatigny’s chambers in U.S. District Court in Hartford, Conn., read aloud a statement attributed to the judge: “It was an honor to be nominated to the Court of Appeals, and I’m deeply grateful to everyone who supported my nomination.” The assistant said Chatigny had no further comment.

There may have been more words in his statement than supporters backing his nomination.  Being less than familiar with Judge Chatigny’s record, his being from the provinces and all, I looked to Norm Pattis for critique.  And critical he was.

Let’s set the record straight: Robert Chatigny’s nomination to the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, one of the most prestigious federal judgeships in the nation, did not fail because of excessive partisanship. It failed because Chatigny was temperamentally unsuited for the position. Chatigny is not a victim.

At the time of his appointment, he had never tried a case to a verdict — ever. Sure, he’s plenty bright. But smart lawyers are a dime a dozen. Lawyers with a feel for what a trial is and how to conduct one are far more rare. That is the sort of sense you cannot acquire merely reading a book or briefs.

And the  trench lawyer movement goes on. Unrecognized and unappreciated.  Next on the President’s list for the Second Circuit?

But instead of seeing this failure of a nominee as an opportunity to promote change and bring experience to the bench, the president is looking to the same old status factories for new judges. He has resubmitted Susan Carney’s name as a nominee for the Second Circuit. As I wrote month’s ago of this nominee:

“For all I know Susan Carney is one of the law’s gems, a legal genius of rarefied intellect and Solomonic wisdom. Her resume is certainly impressive. Harvard College. Harvard Law School. Federal court clerk. Counsel to the Peace Corp. Yale University legal counsel. She glitters.

“Yet for all that, I never heard of Carney until President Barack Obama appointed her for a seat on the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.

Norm summed up the problem in two words, “she glitters.”  Glitters.  Hardly an adjective used to describe anyone who has done time in the trenches.  Trench lawyers are dirty.  Trench lawyers smell funny.  Trench lawyers get blood on their hands from pounding on tables and beating on doors.  Their shoes have holes in their soles from too much walking.  Their suit jackets aren’t always well-pressed.  There may be a tiny drop of marinara sauce on their tie from working during lunch at a back table in the little Italian restaurant around the corner from the courthouse.

But one thing is clear.  Lawyers who work in the trenches do not glitter.

What they do, however, is understand what happens in the trenches when the glitterati make decisions.  The flawed assumptions of how people think and behave, the pretense that they say “play nice” is followed in letter and spirit, the sanitization of the trenches so that none of the muck is splattered on their clean, black robes.  They know that some people are evil and vicious, but that even bad people have nice children who deserve a chance in life.  They know that good people make bad choices, and not everyone who commits a crime deserves death.  Or, if the crime is really bad, death plus cancer.

But I suspect President Obama, despite his elite background, is aware of this.  His problem remains getting nominees past the Senate Judiciary Committee,  This isn’t to say that, if smooth sailing was assured, he would scrape the trenches for a pick.  But he’s struggled up to now, and it’s only going to get worse as Senators like Jeff Sessions, the bankers’ friend, flex their muscles.  It’s comforting to know that the Second Circuit, covering the New York and environs, is protected by the Alabama Republican.

While it’s fine to say that actual lawyer experience like, oh, trying cases or holding the hands of actual litigants would be a worthy factor in considering who should sit on the bench and issue the ruling that will alter the lives of so many, the baggage carried by trench lawyers has too many stickers, too many nicks and cuts, to satisfy the demands of partisanship.  In Washington, it’s all about compromise and consensus, which means that we’re doomed to ride a camel instead of a thoroughbred.

Chances are clearly better for Susan Carney than they are for Robert Chatigny, especially now that his name has been withdrawn.  And Norm is right, she glitters.  But she will never know the feeling of waiting for the jury foreman to announce a verdict, and no one cares.