WASHINGTON — With his nomination of Samuel A. Alito Jr., President Bush has offered the clear-cut choice about the Supreme Court’s direction that activists on the right have been expecting

-- even demanding -- throughout his presidency. Activists on both sides believe the selection of Alito, a federal appellate judge with a staunchly conservative record, to replace moderate

Justice Sandra Day O’Connor could crystallize the debate over issues such as abortion, civil rights and the court’s overall role in society more sharply than any nomination since President

George H.W. Bush picked Clarence Thomas in 1991. “This appointment clearly moves the debate out of the gray and into the black and white,” said Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research

Harriet E. Miers to the court. But for all the fervor they displayed, Alito’s opponents face the challenge of generating significant public resistance to a nominee whose legal credentials

are unquestioned. That hurdle proved far greater than Democrats expected during the confirmation of Roberts as chief justice in September. Conversely, Bush faces the risk that a victory

could impose a heavy cost. Even if opponents cannot generate enough pressure to block Alito’s Senate confirmation, a highly partisan and ideological fight could further damage Bush’s

weakened position with swing voters -- and inflict collateral damage on Republican senators struggling with an inhospitable election climate for 2006. “Bush will probably win this fight, but

at what price?” said the top political advisor to one Republican senator, who asked not to be named when discussing Alito’s nomination. If nothing else, the choice of Alito illuminated

Bush’s political priorities for the weeks ahead. After months of bad news and miscalculations -- which culminated last week in the indictment of Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff,

the 2,000th American military death in Iraq and the withdrawal of Miers’ nomination to the Supreme Court -- Bush’s approval rating has fallen to about 40% in recent polls. Although Bush

won’t face voters again, presidents with approval ratings this low have often seen their party lose seats in congressional midterm elections. Bush has been losing ground on two fronts. New

ABC/Washington Post and CNN/USA Today/Gallup surveys show his approval ratings among independents falling to 35%. But with the Miers’ nomination sparking an intense backlash among

conservatives, Bush’s support among Republicans fell to 80% or less in the surveys, well below the levels that helped generate huge GOP turnouts in the 2002 and 2004 elections. Almost all

observers agree that the Alito pick signaled that Bush was most focused on healing the breach with his core supporters. “If anything came out of [the Miers controversy], it was a reminder to

the White House that Washington is about fighting -- and that it is much better to fight with your opponents than with your friends,” said social conservative activist Gary L. Bauer. Almost

instantly after the president’s announcement, the two parties lined up like football squads that couldn’t wait to begin banging heads. Last week, Concerned Women for America, a leading

social conservative group, helped sink Miers’ nomination by urging her withdrawal. But less than an hour after Bush introduced Alito and his family, the group issued a statement endorsing

the nominee as “eminently qualified.” Other conservatives followed suit. Conversely, liberal groups People for the American Way and the Alliance for Justice, which waited for weeks before

formally opposing Roberts, issued statements opposing Alito on Monday morning. People for the American Way launched a “Stop Alito” website. Ralph G. Neas, the group’s president, said the

effort against Alito would be “totally different” from the Roberts fight. Roberts’ limited experience as a judge, he noted, forced opponents to research his record in the executive branch

for weeks before mobilizing full-scale resistance to him. Alito’s 15-year record on the federal bench will allow opponents to frame the choice much more quickly, Neas said. One clear

difference between Alito and Roberts is the intervening experience of Miers’ failed nomination, said Andrew J. Taylor, a North Carolina State University political scientist. By picking Alito

after Miers withdrew under fire from the right, Bush increased his vulnerability to charges that the choice was a “capitulation” to conservatives, Taylor said. And that, he added, could

make it easier for Democrats to argue that “the president is not governing for the mainstream.” Many Democrats stressed that argument in their first reaction to Alito. Still, the selection

could present Democrats with largely the same challenge they confronted with Roberts: generating decisive resistance to a nominee solely on ideological grounds. Even critics such as Neas

acknowledge that no one will question Alito’s credentials, which include degrees from Princeton and Yale, experience as a U.S. attorney and seven years in the Reagan administration’s Justice

Department. Nominees have sometimes been stymied by charges that they were too ideological, such as conservative Robert H. Bork in 1987. But the inability of opponents to inspire much

opposition to Roberts suggests that without a controversy over ethics or qualifications, engaging the public in a full-scale battle over a Supreme Court nominee isn’t as easy as many in

Washington expected. Polls by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center for the People and the Press have found that, since Bork’s nomination, most Americans have not paid close attention to any

Supreme Court confirmation except Thomas’ -- which produced explosive charges of sexual harassment. And in opinion surveys this year, about one-third of Americans expressed concern that

Bush’s nominees were moving the federal courts too far to the right. Neas and other critics predict it will be easier to fan public resistance to Alito than those numbers suggest, because

his record includes controversial decisions in so many areas -- such as abortion and gun control -- and his confirmation as O’Connor’s successor could so palpably shift the court’s balance

to the right. “If confirmed,” Neas said, “Samuel Alito could literally be a walking constitutional amendment undoing precedents that go back to the 1930s.” But one Republican strategist, who

asked not to be named when discussing White House thinking on the nomination, said Alito’s genial personal manner and rhetorical restraint in his opinions would make it tougher than

opponents expected to convert him into the sort of lightning rod that Bork became. “Democrats won’t light a firestorm in the country, and they won’t light a firestorm in the Senate,” the

strategist said. MORE TO READ