USA Today: Reagan's influence lives on in U.S. courts

They became the first judges in more than a half-century to say the Second Amendment protects an individual's right to own guns...

They are prominent appeals court judges appointed by President Reagan in the 1980s — the products of an unprecedented, meticulous and often controversial screening process that transformed the politics of judicial nominations.

Named to an influential set of 13 regional courts, they were, as a group, young, brainy and bold. They became the legal vanguard of the Reagan agenda to lessen federal control — and protections - in American life.

Now, nearly 20 years after Reagan left office, many of them are at the height of their power. Their opinions routinely draw national attention. Eight are the chief judges of their circuit courts and in key positions on the U.S. judiciary's policymaking committee. Many are superstars of the conservative movement, appearing as speakers at meetings of the arch-conservative Federalist Society and, in past years, landing on GOP presidents' short lists for Supreme Court appointments.

Their influence is a testament to Reagan's promise to set a new course for the nation's law — a promise reverberating in the presidential race today. His lawyers sought nominees who would not try to solve society's problems and who would reverse the trend of judicial involvement in school integration, prison problems and the environment.

...The impact of [the Reagan] appointments is evident throughout the law and on the high court's docket.

A case before the Supreme Court that will determine the Second Amendment's scopearose after Silberman, of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, wrote that it gives individuals the right to bear arms. Silberman's opinion bucked a series of lower-court rulings that said the Second Amendment applied only to a collective right of state militias.

...Reagan's enduring legacy shows the power a president has in shaping the law — not just at the Supreme Court, which gets so much attention, but also in the midlevel appeals courts.

...Reagan's final legacy will be shaped by what happens next.

Says Eleanor Acheson, an assistant attorney general for Clinton who oversaw judicial selection, "The whole name of the game is who will be the next president."

...Republican John McCain has pledged to appoint judges on the right, as Reagan did. Democrats Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton would try to reverse Reagan's legacy.

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