Judges

[lsanderson]

Our Fill-in-the-Blank Constitution
By GEOFFREY R. STONE
Published: April 13, 2010
Chicago

AS the Senate awaits the nomination of a new Supreme Court justice, a frank discussion is needed on the proper role of judges in our constitutional system. For 30 years, conservative commentators have persuaded the public that conservative judges apply the law, whereas liberal judges make up the law. According to Chief Justice John Roberts, his job is just to “call balls and strikes.” According to Justice Antonin Scalia, conservative jurists merely carry out the “original meaning” of the framers. These are appealing but wholly disingenuous descriptions of what judges — liberal or conservative — actually do. More

Comments

[dd-b.livejournal.com]

I'd like to see more judges discuss what judges "really do" in public. A law school professor is a decent second-best; at least if he keeps track of former students and learns what they really do in their jobs.

I don't understand why the conservatives are so effective at defining the terms of discussion in our politics. Maybe they're just better organized.

[yarram.livejournal.com]

If I read that right, he's arguing that one role Supreme Court justices have is to protect people from a "tyrrany of the majority". Which is something I'm inclined to agree with.

Thanks for posting the article!

[don-fitch.livejournal.com]

I find myself tending to accept "the tyranny of the majority" when it leads to more freedoms, while rejecting it when it restricts them, and to note (with displeasure) that Conservative judges too often (for my taste) rule in favor of authoritarian limitations of individual freedom. And yes, it seems to me that "activist judges" are at least as likely to be Conservative as Liberal. The Founders pretty clearly understood that the judicial branch _does_ have an active part in shaping the nature & application of The Law, and intentionally set things up to allow this.

[sethb.livejournal.com]

Given the mischaracterizations in that editorial (e.g. the Supreme Court didn't rule anything about corporations having free speech, it ruled that "Congress shall make no law..." really meant "no law" and not "only laws affecting particular types of entities") (it didn't rule "Affirmative Action is unconstitutional" but rather "Racial Discrimination without a court order is unconstitutional"), etc. (Every single claim he makes is refuted by following the link he provides and actually reading the decision.)

Then, based on his mischaracterizations of those rulings, and a small sample of others, he makes broad claims about the sorts of rulings liberal and conservative judges make.

The level of accuracy is typical for the NY Times.