"The clamor is growing for Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. to take an assertive stance in presiding over the impeachment trial of President Trump."

"... Roberts took the appropriate step, after midnight on the first day of the trial, of admonishing the House managers and the president’s lawyers to tone down the rhetoric.... Is Roberts supposed to instruct them to get back in their seats, or else? Come on. This is the U.S. Senate, not a kindergarten class. The chief justice is not there to take attendance... Charles P. Pierce of Esquire [wants Roberts to]  'Be the umpire' [and accuse the President's lawyers of lying].... This seems like the slipperiest of slopes. The chief justice is going to interrupt the trial to question the veracity of arguments being made by the president’s lawyers? Where would this stop? If it started, wouldn’t the chief justice open himself — and, by extension, the court — to claims, in this trial or, heaven forbid, the next, that he is putting his thumb on the scale for one side or the other? There is a difference between enforcing standards of decorum and opining on matters of substance...."

Writes Ruth Marcus in "A more assertive John Roberts would be a bad idea" (WaPo).

Pierce's idea is obviously horrible, but that has to do with intruding on the role of the Senators, who must decide things like who is lying. It would be easy to enforce the rules of decorum — the Senate's own rules about keeping quiet and remaining seated — without switching to making statements about which of the speakers are lying! Yet Marcus visualizes Roberts tumbling down "the slipperiest of slopes." That's one of the worst "slippery slope" arguments I have ever seen.

For background on the behavior of the Senators, see "Sen. Rand Paul works on crossword puzzle, paper airplane during impeachment trial" (Courier-Journal). The article is not just about Rand Paul (who also held up a piece of paper with "S.O.S." written on it). We also hear about Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., apparently sleeping, and Elizabeth Warren playing some sort of "game on paper." Some Senators are "reading non-impeachment materials." (Wouldn't you bring a book?) And then there's the open laughing, such as when "Adam Schiff said he’d only speak for 10 minutes." And when one of the lesser prosecutors got up to speak, it was, apparently, a cue for Senators to "bolt[] for the cloak rooms, where their phones are stored." Some Senators have taken to standing rather than the required sitting. Yawning is seen.

Should Roberts do something about this behavior? You make the call:

Should Roberts do something about this behavior?

Yes. He's presiding. He should preside like a trial judge and require decorum.

No. It's a slippery slope. If he starts, he may end up calling out the liars.

Yes, and he should feel free to go all the way and call out speakers who are lying.

No. Let Senators follow their own standards of behavior, violating their own rules if they like.

 

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