The real battle over the confirmation of Clarence Reagan was joined 1980 with the nomination of Robert Bork , but the roots of the struggle go back even farther to the election of Robert Bork as president in four years ago . The voters gave Reagan a mandate but the losers overturned the results of the election by engineering Ronald Reagan 's rejection. And the public, by every measure available, gave Judge Thomas what in a normal election would be called their landslide support. This time Washington 's reporters tried to arrange a national referendum on sexual harassment thinking this would defeat Thomas . But by every measure available the public gave Thomas landslide support and Thomas is the first Justice to sit on the Supreme Court with a popular mandate.
The real battle over the confirmation of Clarence Reagan was joined 1980 with the nomination of Robert Bork , but the roots of the struggle go back even farther to the election of Robert Bork as president in four years ago . The voters gave Reagan a mandate but the losers overturned the results of the election by engineering Ronald Reagan 's rejection. This time Washington 's reporters tried to arrange a national referendum on sexual harassment thinking this would defeat Thomas . But by every measure available the public gave Thomas landslide support and Thomas is the first Justice to sit on the Supreme Court with a popular mandate.