WASHINGTON -- To some liberals, it is the smoking gun critics of the Supreme Court nominee Samuel A. Alito Jr. have been looking for -- a 1985 job application in which Judge Alito wrote that he was proud to have participated in the Reagan administration's arguments in the Supreme Court against abortion.

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"Alito's own words reveal his anti-choice legal philosophy," was the way NARAL Pro-Choice America summarized the application.

But for Judge Alito's defenders, his successful application for the post of deputy assistant attorney general is ancient history.

"A statement by Judge Alito two decades ago questioning the constitutionality of the right to an abortion cannot be used to disqualify him for a seat on the high court," said Jay Sekulow, chief counsel of the American Center for Law justice founded by the Rev. Pat Robertson. "The Senate should focus on Judge Alito's judicial philosophy and his 15-year record of service on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit."

Smoking gun or old news? The truth about the 20-year-old letter is probably somewhere in between.

The job application -- in which Mr. Alito, then a lawyer in the solicitor general's office, stressed his conservative and Republican credentials -- does not paint a dramatically different picture from the image of Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. that emerged from memos he wrote as a young Reagan administration lawyer.

Still, the unusually personal language in the application has put Judge Alito on the defensive and prompted Sen. Arlen Specter, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, to ratchet up the scrutiny he plans to apply to the nominee. And, unlike Chief Justice Roberts, Judge Alito won't be able to say that decades-old statements bearing his name reflected the views of his employers or clients.

Judge Alito was anything but shy about his views in applying to be deputy assistant attorney general under then-Attorney General Edwin Meese.

"It has been an honor and source of satisfaction for me to serve in the office of the Solicitor General during President Reagan's administration and to help advance legal positions in which I personally believe very strongly," he wrote. "I am particularly proud of my contributions in recent cases in which the government has argued in the Supreme Court that racial and ethnic quotas should not be allowed and that the Constitution does not protect a right to abortion."

To Judge Alito's critics, these sentiments cinch the case that he would be a right-wing ideologue on the high court.

In a mass e-mail to reporters headlined "Connecting the Dots," the activist group Alliance for Justice linked points made in Judge Alito's job application and his later decisions on an appeals court in cases dealing with criminal procedure, church and state and federalism. On abortion, the Alliance noted, "in the only case in which he participated that presented an open question on women's reproductive rights, Judge Alito wrote in dissent that he would uphold a law requiring a woman in certain circumstances to notify her husband before obtaining an abortion."

Not surprisingly, Judge Alito's defenders connect the dots differently.

"I think the application isn't significantly informative," said Todd F. Gaziano, director of the Center for Legal and Judicial Studies at the Heritage Foundation. "The critics are trying to build a mountain out of a pimple."

Mr. Gaziano noted -- as Judge Alito himself has done in conversations with senators this week -- that the comments that have created controversy were contained in an application for a position that mixed law and politics.

"Alito was saying, 'You might want to know my political bona fides.' In no way does he say his political views dictate his judicial philosophy. He's saying 'I have both. When you need a straight-up legal answer, I'm a guy who believes in [judicial] restraint, but when you need someone to attend a political meeting, I'm that guy, too.' "

On abortion, Mr. Gaziano said, "He was saying, I'm proud of my work in the administration in several areas" including abortion.

Finally, Mr. Gaziano said the paper trail left by Judge Alito isn't very different from that of Chief Justice Roberts, who was confirmed by the Senate despite the fact that he supported Reagan and Bush administration legal positions and signed a brief in which the solicitor general's office said that Roe v. Wade was wrongly decided.