Too bad some of them weren’t more forthcoming during their nomination process.
What the Supreme Court justices won’t say speaks volumes
It’s no secret that the justices of the U.S. Supreme Court have served some hard time in the makeup chair this year. In a welcome development for openness and transparency, many of the justices have done their share of close-ups this term.
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Even some of the justices still unwilling to talk to the cameras have been more amenable to speaking on the record. Justices Antonin Scalia and Stephen Breyer, for instance, engaged in a wide-ranging public debate last December that is available for download on the Web. And ABC’s Greenburg was able to secure interviews with nine justices for her new book, Supreme Conflict: The Inside Story of the Struggle for Control of the United States Supreme Court and America’s Future. Nine justices. That’s a lot more than Bob Woodward got for The Brethren.
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Whether it’s the new chief justice extolling the virtues of unanimity and minimalism, or Stephen Breyer selling his constitutional theory of “active liberty,” the court has finally taken its case to the airwaves, and that is unequivocally good for an America that—for better or worse—has pretty much taken up permanent residence there.
And in general, they seem to avoid talking about the explosive moral issues that tend to divide the court just as they divide the country—gay rights, race-based decision making, abortion, religion. These are the fronts on which the court’s liberals often strive to use constitutional doctrine to protect minority rights. And while there is certainly a sound constitutional basis for their positions, it’s been increasingly tricky for the court’s liberals to explain them in a sound bite. “Active liberty,” as it turns out, requires a whole hour with Charlie Rose to unpack.
I wish Supreme Court justices would not give these kind of substantive interviews at all. I mean, the other two branches of the federal government have become nothing but PR firms for their members. Shouldn’t we have at least one branch that just does its job without pandering to the cameras? If you want to know what Supreme Court justices think about the issues, read their opinions.
and saying that Bush v. Gore has no precedential value is a betrayal of the judicial principle that like cases should be decided similarly. If the Florida recount violated the Equal Protection Clause, other recounts that are handled similarly should also be unconstitutional.
#1…Doug….this PR thing this past term is directly related to the issue of televising Supreme Court trials. The justices don’t want it (or most don’t) because of the pandering to the camera angle among others. So the new Chief Justice has been pushing them to offer up non-controversial speech’s and such to quell the demand for t.v. in the court room. Which would be a disaster in my opinion.
The spin doctors and K Street propagandists have sold the right-wing agenda all along, though voters who buy into it are often shooting themselves in the foot.
Why should a right-leaning set of Supremes be any different? Doug’s point, that making a one-off decision to benefit a specific candidate in 2000 violated every principle of using and setting pecedents, is valid.
Unless the Supremes are using PR to sell ideas that do not derive from the Constitution they’re support to interpret, what’s the point? I fail to see why putting TV cameras into live hearings would be a pertinent alternative to PR.
#2. That makes sense – get the justices out there making speeches to dampen the enthusiasm for cameras in the Supreme Court. But I still don’t like it.
#3. The fundamental principle of our common-law judicial system is that you apply past precedents to current cases, and that you decide current cases with an eye towards how the case will be applied in the future. Just chucking that out because you want a given outcome is indefensible and generates cynicism about the whole process.
#4……I’m not sure, without looking up the case, but didn’t the court say when they ruled on the Florida recount(the recount, NOT the final vote), that it wasn’t a precedent setter?
I could be confused with some commentary I have read about it, but I was just wondering.
#5. Yep, that’s what the court ruled. That B v. G was going to be a one-off case. One of the many things about that decision – which made up a whole new area of Equal Protection jurisprudence, and simultaneously said that it was inapplicable to any other cases – that had legal observers’ jaws dropping. The bold, barefaced partisanship of it was simply staggering. I would not say it was the Court’s low point (the Dred Scott Decision probably takes the cake) but it will ultimately rank among the most infamous decisions ever made.