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President Barack Obama said Friday he will
replace retiring Supreme Court Justice David Souter with someone
who shares the president's respect for "constitutional values"
and hopes to have "him or her" seated on the nation's highest
court by the start of the next term in October.


      In a dramatic flourish, Obama interrupted spokesman Robert
Gibbs' daily press briefing to announce that he had just talked to
Souter. The news of Souter's planned retirement had broken by then,
but the White House had said nothing until the president came in.


      Obama thanked Souter for his dedicated service, and quickly
looked ahead to the nomination of a replacement.


      "As I make this decision," Obama said, "I intend to consult
with members of both parties, across the political spectrum. And it
is my hope that we can swear in our new Supreme Court justice in
time for him or her to be seated by the first Monday in October."


      Souter informed Obama of his plans in a brief letter Friday.
Obama praised Souter and thanked him for his service.


      Souter is leaving after nearly two decades in
Washington. His retirement gives Obama his first pick for the
Supreme Court.


      Souter's departure is unlikely to change the court's
conservative-liberal split. Obama's first pick for the high court
is likely to be a liberal-leaning nominee, much like Souter.


     The vacancy could lead to another woman on the bench to join
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, currently the court's only female
justice.


      At 69, Souter is much younger than either Ginsburg, 76, or
Justice John Paul Stevens, 89, the other two liberal justices whose
names have been mentioned as possible retirees. 


Yet those justices
have given no indication they intend to retire soon and Ginsburg
said she plans to serve into her 80s, despite her recent surgery
for pancreatic cancer.


      In Philadelphia, Sen. Arlen Specter said he would like to see
more ethnic and gender diversity on the high court. 

"I think that,
given the proportion of women in our society, that one out of nine
is under-represented," said Specter, a recent convert to the
Democratic Party. "The court could use some diversity along a
number of lines," he added, mentioning African-Americans and
Hispanics.


      Souter, a regular jogger, is thought to be in excellent health.


      Interest groups immediately began gearing up.


      "Obama's own record and rhetoric make clear that he will seek
left-wing judicial activists who will indulge their passions, not
justices who will make their rulings with dispassion," said Ed
Whelan, president of the conservative Ethics and Public Policy
Center.


      Nan Aron, president of the liberal Alliance for Justice, said,
"We're looking for President Obama to choose an eminently
qualified candidate who is committed to the core constitutional
values, who is committed to justice for all and not just a few."


      Some of the names that have been circulating include recently
confirmed Solicitor General Elena Kagan; U.S. Appeals Court Judges
Sonya Sotomayor, Kim McLane Wardlaw, Sandra Lea Lynch and Diane
Pamela Wood; and Leah Ward Sears, chief justice of the Georgia
Supreme Court.

 Men who have been mentioned as potential nominees
include Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick, Harvard Law professor
Cass Sunstein and U.S. District Judge Ruben Castillo of Chicago.


      Patrick said Friday he's "120 percent" focused on being
governor, but did not rule out interest in a high court
appointment.


      The Obama White House began from almost its first days in office
preparing for the possibility of a retirement by thinking about and
vetting potential high court nominees. Those efforts only
accelerated with Ginsburg's cancer surgery.


      The timing may have been unexpected, but Souter has long yearned
for a life outside Washington.


      He has never made any secret of his dislike for the capital,
once telling acquaintances he had "the world's best job in the
world's worst city." 


When the court finishes its work for the
summer, he quickly departs for his beloved New Hampshire.


      The Rev. John McCausland, an Episcopal minister and friend of
Souter's since college, said he and Souter have talked about what
the justice would do after leaving the court. 


"He expects to go on
senior status at the First Circuit," McCausland said, referring to
the federal appeals court in Boston, "but not to work very
full-time, and he's looking forward to finally having a life and
catching up."


      Souter has been on the court since 1990, when he was an obscure
federal appeals court judge until President George H.W. Bush tapped
him for the Supreme Court.


      Bush White House aide John Sununu, the former conservative
governor of New Hampshire, hailed his choice as a "home run." And
early in his time in Washington, Souter was called a moderate
conservative.


      But he soon joined in a ruling reaffirming woman's right to an
abortion, a decision from 1992 that remains still perhaps his most
noted work on the court.


      Souter became a reliable liberal vote on the court on the social
issues that regularly divide the justices on ideological grounds.
He was one of the four dissenters in the 2000 decision in Bush v.
Gore that sealed the presidential election for George W. Bush.


      Yet as Souter biographer Tinsley Yarbrough noted, "he doesn't
take extreme positions." 


Indeed, in June, Souter sided with Exxon
Mobil Corp. and broke with his liberal colleagues in slashing the
punitive damages the company owed Alaskan victims of the Exxon
Valdez oil spill.


      Souter is the court's 105th justice, only its sixth bachelor. He
works seven days a week through most of the court's October-to-July
terms, a pace that he says leaves time for little else. He told an
audience this year that he undergoes "an annual intellectual
lobotomy" each fall.


      Souter earned his bachelor's and law degrees from Harvard
sandwiched around a stay at Oxford University as a Rhodes scholar.


      He became New Hampshire's attorney general in 1976 and a state
court judge two years later. By 1990, he was on the federal appeals
court in Boston for only a few months when Bush picked him to
replace Justice William Brennan on the Supreme Court.

      National Public Radio first reported Souter's plans Thursday
night.
     

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President Barack Obama said Friday he will
replace retiring Supreme Court Justice David Souter with someone who shares the president's respect for "constitutional values," and hopes to have the new justice seated by October.

Obama hopes to replace Justice Souter by October

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