WASHINGTON -- Rhode Island Senators Jack Reed and Lincoln D. Chafee expressed surprise yesterday at the withdrawal of Harriet Miers' nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court.

"I thought at a minimum that there would be hearings" on the Miers nomination, said Democrat Reed, referring to the Senate Judiciary Committee's confirmation proceedings, which had been scheduled for early next month.

Both senators said the demise of the Miers nomination showed the power of the conservative movement, key leaders of which had strongly criticized President Bush's choice.

"I thought that, as has always happened in the past with the Bush administration, they'd get the votes" to confirm Miers, said Republican Chafee. Chafee said he hoped that Mr. Bush would find a moderate nominee in the mold of retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor.

Reed said Mr. Bush ought to look for a nominee with more experience in constitutional issues -- such as a lawyer, judge or academic -- than Miers, a successful corporate lawyer for most of her career.

Neither Reed nor Chafee had decided whether to vote to seat Miers on the high court; both senators had said they would form their judgments after the Senate hearings.

Chafee and Reed differed on one point. Chafee said he agreed with the White House that Miers, the White House counsel, should not make public the records of her legal deliberations inside the executive department. At the same time, Chafee said he understood why key senators expressed unwillingness to back Miers in the absence of a strong documentary record of dealing in public affairs.

"You want to know more" about a candidate for the Supreme Court than Miers' record shows, Chafee said.

But Reed said he did not take at face value Miers' assertion that the protection of her private deliberations with Mr. Bush was a factor in her withdrawal. "That's an after-the-fact justification for the political reality that she was being hounded by the right wing," Reed said.

Rep. Patrick J. Kennedy said Miers' withdrawal represented Mr. Bush's "complete surrender to the right-wing fringe of his party."

Rep. James R. Langevin called upon Mr. Bush to find a "voice of reason and moderation" in his next Supreme Court selection.