If Eric Holder is confirmed as the next attorney general, the highest law enforcement officer in the United States, he will secure a place in history.

But as President-elect Barack Obama proclaimed in his acceptance speech, what’s to be celebrated is the opportunity to make history.

The attorney general plays a key role in determining whether our civil liberties are protected or violated. Under the Bush administration, the government was just as likely to be on the wrong side of protecting Americans as supporting them, employing unauthorized wiretapping, spying on ordinary citizens, and sanctioning torture, all to the detriment of our nation’s security.

Holder can change all this. But will he?

Although Holder is undoubtedly a very capable and experienced civil servant, a tension persists between what he says and what he has done.

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