His name is the Rev. Tom Haggard. He heads up the National Association of Evangelicals. He’s off to Washington this week to confer with White House leaders about future Supreme Court nominations. He believes the 51 to 48 win last week by President Bush is a mandate from the American people that they endorse Bush’s nominations of conservative judges and he wants to make sure Bush stays on course.

Another Colorado player entering the judicial sweepstakes arena is James Dodson, who heads up the Focus on the Family, also in Colorado Springs. His group is behind the move to block Arlen Specter from chairing the Senate Judiciary Committee .

On ABC’s “This Week” on Sunday, ministry founder James Dobson said the Pennsylvania Republican “must be derailed” after suggesting the Senate will not approve justices who want to overturn legal abortion. Specter has since backed off, saying he was not issuing a warning but instead speaking of the likelihood of Democratic filibusters. But Dobson is not budging.

Dobson on Sunday called putting conservative judges on the bench “the key to everything” and expressed confidence Bush would deliver.

It was assumed immediately following the election that Colorado evangelical voters came out in droves for President Bush. Further analysis of the vote has shown that might not be the case:

Exit polls showed Bush benefited greatly from the evangelical vote. But his winning coalition also included churchgoing Catholics and higher-than-expected support from moderate religious believers and the secular, further analysis has shown.