WASHINGTON — When Samuel A. Alito Jr. graduated from Princeton University in 1972, he was clearly a young man on the move: His yearbook said he would "eventually warm a seat on the Supreme Court."
And, in fact, his legal career has seemed scripted to do precisely that.
The man President Bush has chosen to become the 110th justice of the Supreme Court has an Ivy League pedigree and a blue-chip resume. The son of an immigrant, at age 40 he became one of the youngest people ever to sit on a federal appeals court.
Alito also has compiled ideological credentials -- a stint in the Reagan administration, participation in the conservative Federalist Society, and court opinions on abortion and religion in public life -- that make him a darling of conservative activists, whose criticism helped force White House Counsel Harriet E. Miers to withdraw her nomination last week.
He also has enough similarities to Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia -- Italian American roots, pronounced conservative views -- that he has been dubbed "Scalito."
But friends say the comparison is off-base, because Alito does not have the acerbic style that is Scalia's trademark.
"Yes, he's conservative and gives deference to statutes, but these opinions of Scalia are biting and critical," said Tom Neuberger, a veteran civil rights lawyer in Delaware, who has appeared before Alito about half a dozen times in recent years. "I've never seen that in his writing.... I don't think he has an agenda."
Some friends are less apt to compare Alito to Scalia than to John G. Roberts Jr., Bush's newly installed chief justice.
"There are about a half-dozen lawyers who are John's equal -- and Sam is one of them," said Charles J. Cooper, a lawyer who worked with Alito in the Justice Department during the Reagan years.
Although Alito's career and education were blueblood, his roots were unpretentious. His late father, Samuel, came to the United States from Italy as an infant. Alito was born in Trenton, N.J., and grew up in the state capital's suburbs.
His father was a schoolteacher and then director of New Jersey's Office of Legislative Services, a nonpartisan office that researches and writes legislation. Friends say Alito's father inspired him to pursue a career in public service. His mother, Rose, who is about to turn 91, also was a teacher.
