the very communities my colleagues have suggested you're making less safe shows just how off base these attacks are and in my view is a testament to your qualities and qualifications. so we all agree, all of us, that it's critical to protect our children and prevent the kinds of heinous crimes we've heard about in some detail earlier today. it's why i'm introduing a bipartisan reauthorization of the victims of child abuse act, something we could act on as a committee to do our job, which is to set policy and pass laws. but i also frankly think we need to be mindful that we're asking of you to get engaged in that policy dispute in front of this committee, which is not the role of a judge, something you well understand. let me turn if i could to another reason i think you're deeply qualified and that you will bring something important to the supreme court. brian stevenson, one of america's leading civil rights lawyers and by happy coincidence