WASHINGTON - President Bush renominated Brigham Young University general counsel Thomas Griffith to a seat on the federal appeals court Monday, along with 11 other nominees who were not confirmed by the last Congress. Griffith, who was the Senate's counsel during the Clinton impeachment process, is a close friend of Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, who has worked hard for his nomination and who says Griffith deserves to be on the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Griffith's nomination was hampered in the last Congress by questions over a three-year lapse in his law license while he was counsel for the Senate. Griffith said he deeply regretted the license suspension that was due to a clerical error that caused his dues to go unpaid. He also did not obtain a Utah license after becoming counsel at BYU. Instead, licensed attorneys have consulted on legal matters at the school. Griffith has also been criticized for opposing a portion of a federal law that would give women opportunities in school athletics roughly proportionate to their population. -The Salt Lake Tribune