Here comes the Obama judges ... do we need to prepare for the "mass freeing of criminal defendants"?

Just before the 2008 election, Senator John McCain wrote this op-ed asserting that "Obama's judges would coddle criminals,"  and Professor Steven Calabresi, in this op-ed in the Wall Street Journal, warned that if Barack Obama becomes President and appoints a large number of federal judges, "we could possibly see ... the abolition of capital punishment and the mass freeing of criminal defendants."  If anyone took this heated punditry to heart, now it's time to double-lock the doors and keep the kids from playing outside: according to this New York Times article, "President Obama is expected to name his first candidate to an appeals court seat this week."

Interestingly, the headline for this Times report is "Moderate Is Said to Be Pick for Court," and here are a few more particulars:

President Obama is expected to name ... David F. Hamilton, a highly regarded federal trial court judge from Indiana, for the appeals court in Chicago....

Judge Hamilton, who is said by lawyers to represent some of his state’s traditionally moderate strain, served as counsel to Senator Evan Bayh when Mr. Bayh was the state’s governor; he is also a nephew of former Representative Lee H. Hamilton of Indiana.

A senior administration official said Judge Hamilton would have the support of both Mr. Bayh, a Democrat, and the state’s other senator, Richard G. Lugar, a Republican.

Ooh, Judge Hamilton sure does sound scary, doesn't he?  And given that Judge Hamilton is from the state that birthed infamous figures like Senator Ted Stevens and speeder David Letterman (not to mention Chief Justice John Roberts and Johnny Appleseed and Larry Bird), who knows what we should expect once Judge Hamilton gets a chance to use his Hoosier charms to influence the likes of Judges Easterbrook and Posner on the Seventh Circuit.

All kidding aside, the Times article notes a recent sex offender sentencing ruling by Judge Hamilton that likely will get (too much?) attention given the modern affinity for partisan judicial confirmation battles:

In 2008, Judge Hamilton struck down as unconstitutional an amendment to the state law requiring convicted sex offenders to provide the authorities with personal information, including any e-mail addresses or user names.  The amendment would also have required the offenders to agree to allow their home computers to be searched at any time and to pay for a program to allow monitoring of their Internet use.

The judge said the amendment cut into the heart of a person’s right to privacy in his home.  “The ability of the individual to retreat into his home and therefore to be free from unreasonable intrusion by the government stands at the very core” of constitutional protections against unreasonable searches, he said.

I reported and linked to this ruling by Judge Hamilton in this post, where I speculated that this 52-page(!) ruling "might make its way to the Seventh Circuit and perhaps further."  I do not know if Judge Hamilton's ruling has been appealed, though I suspect we will hear a lot more about this case if Judge Hamilton is soon tapped to move up to the Seventh Circuit.

Some related old and new posts on judicial appointments:

• Names starting to emerge for early Obama circuit court nominees
• Noticing the biggest bias in the federal judiciary
• How a new administration is likely to impact federal sentencing practice
• Why federal sentencing reformers must focus on the USSC and lower courts
• Judging, politics, sentencing and elections
• Brave New Justice and sentencing issues
• A modest(?) proposal for filling the bench from the ivory tower
• Urging President-elect Obama to elevate district judges to the circuit courts

UPDATE:  And so it begins.  This official press release reports that "President Barack Obama announced his intent to nominate Judge David Hamilton to the United States 7th Circuit Court of Appeals."  In response, former judge Paul Cassell at Volokh here describes Judge Hamilton as " a very sensible and reasonable person -- a good selection for the Seventh Circuit."  But the folks at National Review's bench memos do not seem too pleased as evidenced by these new posts over there:

• Obama's First Appellate Court Nominee: Hard Left
• Seventh Circuit Candidate David Hamilton—An ACLU “Moderate”!