Wrote Adam Liptak of the NYT, in "One Justice Missing and Only One Masked, the Supreme Court Returns/As a term packed with major cases begins, much has changed since the last in-person arguments took place in March 2020."
The justices asked questions in the familiar free-for-all fashion that has long been their practice. But they supplemented such free-form questioning with an opportunity for justices to ask questions in order of seniority one by one after each lawyer argued, replicating the format the court used in the telephone arguments while it was exiled from its courtroom.
Interesting. I wonder if they worried that the free-for-all was systemic racism. I think they need to, even though they only have the ultra-small sample of one black person in the group.
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Who was that masked Justice? Sonia Sotomayor.
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That article went up on Monday, but I'm only just getting around to reading it this morning. The first day of the Supreme Court term feels much less eventful to me than it used to. The break between the end of one term and the beginning of the next seems short. And they do weigh in on things during the interval. Do we miss them when they're (more or less) gone?
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Justice Breyer — my favorite Justice based on the way he talks — asked a question about San Francisco fog:“Suppose somebody came by in an airplane and took some of that beautiful fog and flew it to Colorado, which has its own beautiful air. And somebody took it and flew it to Massachusetts or some other place. Do you understand how I’m suddenly seeing this and I’m totally at sea?"
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32 comments:
Breyer has been at sea his entire time on the bench. You can’t put fog in an airplane.
Of course, the one justice masked was Justice Sotomayor. Of course. It does not raise my opinion of her.
I do miss the days of the Court disappearing for weeks, and not making regular comments about social things outside of the court. Not making outside comments at all, if possible, until they are in session.
Who was missing?
"Who was that masked Justice?" Cute.
“Suppose somebody came by in an airplane and took some of that beautiful fog and flew it to Colorado, which has its own beautiful air. And somebody took it and flew it to Massachusetts or some other place. Do you understand how I’m suddenly seeing this and I’m totally at sea?"
If by San Francisco "fog" Breyer means the befuddled mental leftism that predominates: yes, every potential destination should be concerned with the political effect of the outward migratory flight from the feces filled streets of San Francisco.
Wise Latina-x, fearing death, dons mask. LOL!
“Suppose somebody came by in an airplane and took some of that beautiful fog and flew it to Colorado, which has its own beautiful air. And somebody took it and flew it to Massachusetts or some other place. Do you understand how I’m suddenly seeing this and I’m totally at sea?"
Yes, you are totally out to sea.
“ Who was missing?”
Kavanaugh had to zoom in because he’s tested positive for covid.
So a Supreme Court justice is wearing a piece of cloth on her face to stop a virus.
The gaps in that cloth are orders of magnitude larger than a virus.
Democrats are just stupid sheep.
I'm assuming you're kidding about the seniority questioning being systemic racism? If not, could you explain?
No doubt every person in that courtroom is vaxxed, and I'd wager a huge number are boosted. And some also have had the Wu Flu to boot. The idea that a mask is doing anything beneficial such that Satanmayor is wearing one is laughable.
But then Sonia is barely smart enough to be a lawyer, let alone a Supreme Court justice. So I suppose it's fitting that she is the bemasked one.
Kavanaugh had to zoom in because he’s tested positive for covid.
And I note that your fellow lefties have publicly hoped he dies from it.
Was Breyer's brain on board that airplane? Sounds like it wasn't along for the ride.
I'm quite disappointed to learn our hostess actually believes "systemic racism" is a thing!
Perhaps Justice Thomas didn't previously ask questions because others had already asked the ones he came up with? I know that happens to me at times.
Justice Breyer’s analogy wasn’t very good. As I understand it, Mississippi has filed a “You Drank My Milkshake” case against Tennessee, regarding wells in Tennessee that are pumping water out of an aquifer that extends into Mississippi.
The better analogy would be someone standing in Nevada near the California border and sucking in air with a straw, air that was in California but was drawn into Nevada by the action of the person with a straw. The idea of the airplane coming into California and taking the air introduces a physical intrusion that is not present in the case, so yes, Breyer is at sea.
"I'm quite disappointed to learn our hostess actually believes "systemic racism" is a thing!"
It most certainly is. As with many things, people build up tolerances, and ordinary racism just isn't enough to hold anybody's attention anymore. But fortify it with "systemic" and now, you've really got something. Of course the novelty of this, too, shall in time wear off and a new and improved version of racism will be needed. Maybe "double-secret racism"? Who knows?
When I first saw this topic I became concerned that LLR Chuck would vomit up another of his viciously racist posts against conservative African Americans such as Clarence Thomas, Thomas Sowell and Ben Carson.
I'm hoping Althouse is exercising vigorous moderation to minimize the possibility of anyone having to see another of these racist attacks by our pro-marxist LLR Chuck.
The SF and Colorado fog would have a much higher THC content than Massachusetts...
'Kavanaugh had to zoom in because he’s tested positive for covid.'
Bullshit. According to MSNBC, he was organizing a gang-rape session.
Totally believable...
Modern airliners replace the air in the cabin approximately every 5 minutes. The SF fog would be gone before the plane reached the CA/NV border.
To be most fair to Sotamayor she has co-morbidities that put her at significant risk if she does catch COVID, aside from age obviously by which Breyer is too.
Trump expected her to give him his fourth SCOTUS appointment. Crazy years that we live in perhaps she still could somewhere down the line.
TheOne Who Is Not Obeyed
"But then Sonia is barely smart enough to be a lawyer, let alone a Supreme Court" justice.
She earned a B.A. in 1976 from Princeton University, graduating summa cum laude and receiving the university’s highest academic honor. In 1979, she earned a J.D. from Yale Law School where she served as an editor of the Yale Law Journal
Who's the dumb one Sparky?
Sotamayor is a diabetic. It's perfectly acceptable for her to have a mask on if she thinks it's effective. Her legal findings are another story.
I'm assuming you're kidding about the seniority questioning being systemic racism? If not, could you explain?
You misread her. Her position is exactly the opposite. She was wondering if the Court was worried that the previous system, a "free for all", could be seen as racist. She then agreed that they should be worried about that. She clearly was supporting the seniority system.
What I am unclear about is whether Althouse believes that the previous system was systematic racism, or merely believes that other people might.
Breyer is my neighbor.
If there’s one black person, and the experience was that in one system he did not speak at all and in the other he participated equally, they ought to choose the latter approach unless there’s a very good reason not to.
Ann Althouse: "If there’s one black person, and the experience was that in one system he did not speak at all and in the other he participated equally, they ought to choose the latter approach unless there’s a very good reason not to."
Aren't there a few more variables to consider as relevant before making a pronouncement? Subject matter? Maybe the Justice is having a different sort of day/week? Particular point of law under review?
Drago said...
When I first saw this topic I became concerned that LLR Chuck would vomit up another of his viciously racist posts against conservative African Americans such as Clarence Thomas, Thomas Sowell and Ben Carson.
I'm hoping Althouse is exercising vigorous moderation to minimize the possibility of anyone having to see another of these racist attacks by our pro-marxist [sic] LLR Chuck.
My hope is that Althouse will find good reason to occasionally block uncalled-for, repetitious and often false personal attacks against other commenters who are rightfully entitled to their own pertinent opinions. Disagreements are useful in a thread where the subject is controversial but personal attacks are always garbage.
gadfly: "My hope is that Althouse will find good reason to occasionally block uncalled-for, repetitious and often false personal attacks against other commenters who are rightfully entitled to their own pertinent opinions."
It is entirely unsurprising you are supportive of LLR Chuck's previous racist posts.
I've read that military planning sometimes involves asking all participants to provide questions or opinions, and that the least senior person present starts off, so as to avoid influence upon their statements by higher ranking members. Perhaps the Supremes are trying to avoid a different problem by starting with the senior member than such undue influence.
SC Justices are equals in rank, led by the Chief, so forget the military issue of rank, and questions by seniority isn't solving racism (Sotomeyer is Hispanic, right? Or is she a white Hispanic, like Zimmerman?) or avoidng sexism (some justices identify as male, some as female, last I heard, but maybe they're keeping such issues private). I'd guess it has to do with a simple way to order the questioners, which they all will remember, without having to do intersectionality identity-group metamagical mathematics. Because as Barbie once famously said, "Math is hard!"
Questions from Supreme Court justices are interesting to observers because they sometimes can indicate how that justice will vote. I believe Supreme Court practitioners would, if they were candid, admit that neither the question nor the answer is likely to affect the outcome of the case. The written briefs are crucial. They are almost entirely about legal precedents since the Supreme Court does not engage in fact-finding (except sub rosa). My uninformed sense of Justice Thomas is he always knew that it was the briefs the matter, and he didn't need to grandstand or show off by asking clever questions. The Justices have many clerks who help them with the legal research. You wouldn't, as a Supreme Court Justice, need to rely on what the lawyers say, as might a busy District Court judge. I suppose sometimes one party, especially the government, can make a concession or an assertion at argument that can help define an issue and make it easier to form a majority of the nine. But on the whole live arguments are judicial theater and exist as a historical curiosity and to feed Linda Greenhouse-type journalism. (Speaking as a long-ago clerk to a federal appellate judge, many decades ago. I don't think I ever saw oral argument change any appellate judges mind, except when a judge had missed something in the factual record. Of course, it's very different at the initial federal level in District Court, where facts matter a lot.)
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