Herb Kohl

From Judgepedia

Herb Kohl (b.1935) is a Democratic U.S. Senator and the Vice Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Senator Kohl is the senior Senator from Wisconsin.

Early life and education

Senator Kohl grew up in Milwaukee and attended public school in the City of Milwaukee. Kohl graduated from college from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1956 and later graduated with his Master's in Business Administration degree from Harvard in 1958. ^[1]

Professional career

Herb Kohl is noted for being the owner of Kohl's Food and Department Stores. Kohl owned the company from 1970 till the sale of the company in 1979. In 1985, Senator Kohl became owner of the NBA's Milwaukee Bucks and still is the principal owner of the team. ^[1]

Senate career

Senator Kohl was first elected to the US Senate in 1988 and was re-elected in 1994, 2000, and 2006. His current term expires in 2012. ^[1]

Senate Judiciary Committee

Senator Kohl has served on the Senate Judiciary Committee since he was first sworn into office in 1989. In 2009, Senator Kohl was named Vice Chairman of the Committee when the late Edward Kennedy stepped down and long time Senate Judiciary Committee member Joe Biden was elected Vice President of the United States. Before his promotion to Vice-Chairman, Senator Kohl rated fourth in seniority on the committee.

Senator Kohl is also the Chairman on the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Antitrust, Competition Policy and Consumer Rights. ^[2]

Notable moments

Alleged BCS anti-trust

Senator Kohl was outspoken over possible anti-trust problems caused by College Football's Bowl Championship Series. In 2009, Senator Kohl, along with fellow Senate Judiciary Committee member Orrin Hatch, investigated possible anti-trust violations after the University of Utah Utes were not given a chance to play in the the 2008-2009 BCS National Championship. University officials felt they were passed over because of their status as a member of the Mountain West Conference despite being the only undefeated team in nation in 2008. Senator Kohl said this in a statement:

"The Bowl Championship Series (BCS) generates revenue for participating schools at a level that is unmatched in the history of collegiate sports. Even teams that never play in a BCS game are able to reap the financial benefits simply by virtue of their membership in one of the six original BCS conferences. Though the BCS claims to represent all of college football – even going so far as to call the winner of the BCS Championship Game the 'National Champion' – the BCS system leaves nearly half of all the teams in college football at a competitive disadvantage when it comes to qualifying for the millions of dollars paid out every year."

"This system’s critics allege that the system is not only unfair to the football fans throughout the country, but also to the colleges and universities nationwide that depend on revenues from their football teams to fund their other athletic programs. They further argue that, at the very least, a fair system would provide equal opportunity, regardless of conference, for all teams to play their way into one of the BCS’s bowl games and, if they’re good enough, to compete for the national championship."-Senator Herb Kohl^[3]

A hearing was held by the Senate Judiciary Committee on July 7, 2009. ^[4]

Clarence Thomas confirmation

Senator Kohl is noted for his questions during the highly charged confirmation hearings of Justice Clarence Thomas in 1991 on the issue of judicial empathy. ^[5] The transcript below details this exchange:

Senator KOHL: All right. Judge Thomas, I would like to ask you why you want this job?

Judge THOMAS: Senator, being nominated to the Supreme Court of the United States is one of the highest callings in our country. It is an opportunity. It is an entrustment, an entrusting of responsibility by the people of this country, by this body, to make some of the most difficult and important decisions in our country. It is an opportunity to serve, to give back. That has been something that has been important to me. And I believe Senator, that I can make a contribution, that I can bring something different to the Court, that I can walk in the shoes of the people who are affected by what the Court does. You know, on my current court, I have occasion to look out the window that faces C Street, and there are converted buses that bring in the criminal defendants to our criminal justice system, busload after busload. And you look out, and you say to yourself, and I say to myself almost every day, But for the grace of God there go I. So you feel that you have the same fate, or could have, as those individuals. So I can walk in their shoes, and I can bring something different to the Court. And I think it is a tremendous responsibility, and it is a humbling responsibility; and it is one that, if confirmed, I will carry out to the best of my ability.

Senator KOHL: All right. That is good. Judge Thomas, if I understand you correctly, you are going to leave behind almost all of your views about what type of society we ought to be and what type of policies we ought to apply and two questions. First, why after 20 years in the forefront of these battles do you want to leave all of this behind? And the second question is, if you do leave so much of this behind, what's left?

JUDGE THOMAS: Though it may sound rather strange to some individuals, the kind of fighting and infighting and certainly the difficulty of battle, those kinds of battles in the political process I think are wearing, and so it's not the confrontation that I ever relished or enjoyed. In fact, that is the opposite of my personality. I like to try to find consensus. So I don't miss and did not miss on this court having those kinds of battles. We have reasoned, constructive debate on the court.

But with respect to the underlying concerns and feelings about people being left out, about our society not addressing all the problems of people, I have those concerns. I'll take those to the grave with me. I am concerned about the kids of those buses, I told you. I am concerned about the kids who didn't have the strong grandfather and strong grandparents to help them out of what I would consider a terrible, terrible fate. But you carry that feeling with you. You carry that strength with you. You carry those experiences with you. I don't think you have to carry the battles with you. It's a different way. ^[5]

Sirius/XM Merger deal

Senator Kohl was a vocal critic of the merger of satellite radio giants Sirius and XM in 2007. The Senator was opposed to the merger, claiming that satellite radio was its own market and not part of a larger entertainment market. The senator rebutted claims from industry executives who believe that satellite radio's place in the market is not a stand alone market. Satellite radio executives claimed that if no merger happened, no new satellite radio technologies could be spearheaded.

Kohl argued that since there is no substitute product for satellite radio customers would be subject to sharp price increases should the merger occur. In 2007, the Senator pressed the Federal Communications Commission and the United States Department of Justice to investigate the merger deal on possible antitrust violations. ^[6]

Text messaging

On June 16, 2009, Senator Kohl brought the executives of AT&T and Verizon to testify in front of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Antitrust, Competition Policy and Consumer Rights. Kohl's purpose for the hearing was to examine the causes of rising text messaging prices. He raised concerns over mergers in the cell phone sector of the telecommunications industry as a cause of prices increasing for text messaging. Statistics show that text messaging rates from 2006 to 2008 raised by over 100%. One of the main concerns Senator Kohl had was that in the beginning of 2009 four cell phone companies (AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, and TMobile) controlled 90% of the text messaging market. Senator Kohl also was concerned that over 60% of the market is controlled by AT&T and Verizon alone. ^[7]

External links

• Senator Kohl's official website
• Senator Kohl's Biography at the Senate Judiciary Committee
• Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Antitrust, Competition Policy and Consumer Rights
• Senator Kohl on VoteSmart

References