To the editor:

Like the editor of this newspaper, I also am concerned about the level of hostility and name-calling that has passed for debate on qualifications of six of President Bush’s federal judge nominees. However, I would be more inclined to criticize the behavior of the Democrats if I were able to understand how the Republicans, who disallowed even a hearing to more than 90 of President Clinton’s nominees to federal judgeships, expect 100 percent of President Bush’s nominees to be approved. The Republicans established a precedent for holding up nominees they regarded as unqualified or as holding unacceptably extreme views; the Democrats are now playing by the same rules.

Mr. Bush was inaugurated after one of the most bitterly contested elections in our history. The mandate Mr. Bush received in that election did not give him the right to appoint people to federal judgeships who are clearly unacceptable to the roughly 50 percent of the electorate who voted for his opponent.

I wish the level of political debate were more civil and less polarized, but not if that ideal can be obtained only by the complete and uncritical acceptance of whomever Mr. Bush chooses to nominate for lifetime appointments to federal judgeships.

Oliver Finney,

Lawrence