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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsAntonin Scalia's Blunder Is Unprecedented, Legal Experts Say
Justice Antonin Scalia's factual error in a dissenting opinion Tuesday has become the talk of the legal community as experts puzzle over the extraordinary nature of the Reagan-appointed justice's blunder, which the Supreme Court quietly corrected as of Wednesday morning.
It's common for the Supreme Court to make typographical corrections and insubstantial edits to a decision after its release. But it's exceedingly rare to see a factual error that helps form the basis for an opinion. Legal experts say Scalia's mistake appears to be wholly unprecedented in that it involves a justice flatly misstating core facts from one of his own prior opinions.
"This is a topic I know fair amount about, and I do not know of any other instance when a Justice has mischaracterized one of his own prior opinions, let alone in such a loud fashion and when he is otherwise criticizing others for their blunders," said Richard J. Lazarus, a Harvard law professor. "I strongly doubt it has ever happened before."
"I have seen sloppy footnoting before but nothing this bad," said Garrett Epps, a constitutional law professor at the University of Baltimore.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/antonin-scalia-blunder-unprecedented-epa
blkmusclmachine
(16,149 posts)brush
(53,772 posts)I'm sure I'm not the only who thought of the "S" (senile) word, considering his age. Some people stay sharp as they age, some not so much.
And Scalia has taken some high-profile but not necessarily cogent stances lately.
elleng
(130,886 posts)especially in light of Justice Stevens' recent explanation of why he retired when he did. He said, in an interview with I forget whom, that he decided to retire when, while doing an interview, he found himself briefly unable to come up with just the right words to use, suggesting his mind wasn't what it should be.
yeoman6987
(14,449 posts)I think that Justice Ginsburg should have retired awhile ago and I love the woman, but there comes a time when retirement is a nice thing for them. It is kinda crazy for them to go with death.
Helen Borg
(3,963 posts)It seems to me that this is evidence he is not fit to do his job. Therefore, he should submit to various cognitive tests and if he does not pass he should be replaced. If a train conductors cannot perform her job safely, wouldn't she be prevented from operating the train?
Scuba
(53,475 posts)malaise
(268,966 posts)Time to say goodbye to this scumbag- maybe dementia is setting in
Retrograde
(10,134 posts)"Facts are stupid things".
aquart
(69,014 posts)Retrograde
(10,134 posts)He was supposed to say something like "Facts are stubborn things", but I found it very revealing. IIRC, it was towards the end of his second term.
SomeGuyInEagan
(1,515 posts)And tattooed onto the foreheads of Junior, Gingrich, Palin, Bachmann and the rest.
Bernardo de La Paz
(49,001 posts)calimary
(81,222 posts)mountain grammy
(26,619 posts)Warpy
(111,254 posts)that he might be put under pressure to resign.
He's been showing signs of dementia for some time.
eggplant
(3,911 posts)Warpy
(111,254 posts)I hoped that he'd quit once Roberts was appointed Chief Justice, skipping right over his head. That really should have done it and it was also probably recognition that Scalia was slowly losing what few marbles he'd ever had.
However, the risk of keeping him there is even greater the more his dementia starts to show.
eggplant
(3,911 posts)But short of Congress booting his ass out (and the odds of that happening are zero) he'll only leave feet first. He would never voluntarily retire. I bet that even if he had a visibly debilitating disease, he still wouldn't leave.
More's the pity. His legacy will take decades to undo.
JDPriestly
(57,936 posts)passed around. Scalia's "mistake" is not just embarrassing. It is a sign of arrogance, overconfidence and a lack of professional integrity. Sure, it can happen in a small law office (or even a big one) in which the lawyers and staff are all struggling to get the bills paid and the work done on deadlines.
But there is no excuse for that kind of "error" at the Supreme Court.
Here is the list of Scalia's current law clerks. They graduated from some of the best law schools in the country. This is shameful. It demonstrates the lack of care, the lack of respect for stare decisis on the part of Scalia and his team.
Scalia should resign. He is clearly past his prime and unable to give to his work the kind of attention and dedication that it requires.
Remember. Scalia is one of the maybe 10-15 most powerful people in our government. He should quit while he is ahead.
Scalia should resign.
tishaLA
(14,176 posts)over the past five years lead me to believe he may need to be forced to step down from the bench. Soon, he will be flinging feces at the walls--not just in his legal opinions, either.
progressoid
(49,988 posts)The sooner he goes, the better.
Arugula Latte
(50,566 posts)Because it needs to happen, pronto.
Rex
(65,616 posts)Do they get impeached from the bench? Someone will come along and tell us.
yeoman6987
(14,449 posts)they would NEVER do that.
Rex
(65,616 posts)I wonder.
hedgehog
(36,286 posts)Since the 1970 impeachment hearings, Douglas wanted to retire from the court. He wrote to his friend and former student Abe Fortas: "My ideas are way out of line with current trends, and I see no particular point in staying around and being obnoxious".[25]
At age 76 on December 31, 1974, while on vacation in the Bahamas, Douglas suffered a debilitating stroke in the right hemisphere of his brain. It paralyzed his left leg and forced him to use a wheelchair. Douglas, severely disabled, insisted on continuing to participate in Supreme Court affairs despite his obvious incapacity. Seven of his fellow justices voted to postpone until the next term any argued case in which Douglas' vote might make a difference.[31] At the urging of Fortas, Douglas finally retired on November 12, 1975, after 36 years of service.
Douglas submitted his resignation to now President Gerald Ford. In his response, Ford put aside former differences and paid tribute to the retiring justice, writing:
"May I express on behalf of all our countrymen this nation's great gratitude for your more than thirty-six years as a member of the Supreme Court. Your distinguished years of service are unequaled in all the history of the Court."[32]
Ford also hosted Douglas as an honored guest at a White House state dinner later that same month, writing of the occasion later: "We had had differences in the past, but I wanted to stress that bygones were bygones."[33]
Douglas believed that he could take senior status, and tried to continue serving on the Court. According to Woodward and Armstrong, Douglas refused to accept his retirement and tried to participate in the court's cases well into 1976, after Stevens had taken his former seat. Douglas reacted with outrage when, returning to his old chambers, he discovered that his clerks had been reassigned to Stevens, and when he tried to file opinions in cases whose arguments he had heard before his retirement. Chief Justice Warren Burger ordered all justices, clerks, and other staff members to refuse to help Douglas in those efforts. When Douglas tried in March 1976 to hear arguments in a capital-punishment case, (Gregg v. Georgia), the nine sitting justices signed a formal letter informing him that his retirement had ended his official duties on the court. Only then did Douglas withdraw from Supreme Court business.[34] One commentator has attributed some of his behavior after his stroke to anosognosia, a neuropsychological presentation which leads an affected person to be unaware and unable to acknowledge disease in himself. It often results in defects in reasoning, decision making, emotions, and feeling.[35]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_O._Douglas#Retirement
ashling
(25,771 posts)"Argle - Bargle"
Frustratedlady
(16,254 posts)That should wipe that silly grin off his face for a while.
What would Thomas do if he lost his sidekick?
HangOnKids
(4,291 posts)As always.
Ikonoklast
(23,973 posts)Oh, wait...
Baitball Blogger
(46,703 posts)King Scalia got caught. Heads will roll!
Daemonaquila
(1,712 posts)It's unlikely that someone else did the writing and research. Clerks are some of the brightest, most detail oriented people in the field, especially those hired by SCOTUS or appeals court judges. It's virtually inconceivable that one of them made such a blunder. It's more likely that a clerk felt that arguing with a Justice was below his pay grade, and thus will have no job in a few days after this embarrassment.
Baitball Blogger
(46,703 posts)If he owns that mistake, he should be removed for incompetence.
msanthrope
(37,549 posts)JHB
(37,159 posts)Thomas signed on with Scalia's dissent, but he and his didn't sniff out the discrepancy.
Hekate
(90,667 posts)TNNurse
(6,926 posts)He should go back to law school or maybe retake the bar exam. He seems to have forgotten a little too much. Or he is just an arrogant, ignorant awful person?
Rex
(65,616 posts)of the Union by such a reprobate? I will no longer call him a judge or by his name or even a snarky nickname...he is merely known to me now as reprobate.
tanyev
(42,552 posts)[URL=.html][IMG][/IMG][/URL]
aquart
(69,014 posts)BrotherIvan
(9,126 posts)Left untreated for so long it can lead to brain fog, overall pain, fatigue & CFS, and symptoms that look like dementia. But it doesn't account for being an evil prick.
Bye, Tony!
Gothmog
(145,168 posts)I have been practicing law for a long time and this is not typical. Scalia really screwed up here and I am concerned that he is indeed going senile.
ashling
(25,771 posts)vote after Wendy's filibuster.
As long as the record looks ok on paper.
Gothmog
(145,168 posts)Dewhurst was threatening to backdate but once he saw the Texas Tribune video of the debate with a time stamp on it, he drop that idea.
giftedgirl77
(4,713 posts)with the stamp. You could tell they wanted to so badly. As far as Scalia goes, I can't believe they don't do some kind of review prior to publishing (like 10) to make sure everything was on point.
calimary
(81,222 posts)But let it be that scum scalia and there's silence.
aquart
(69,014 posts)mountain grammy
(26,619 posts)Maybe old Dick's a better shot now... Because, I'll bet money on this: he'll never leave voluntarily!
grasswire
(50,130 posts)Couldn't he just be "creating his own reality"?
he is suffering from Alzheimer's for sure - but, he has been an angry man (not an angry black man - just angry) for decades and now is losing his memory and mind. he's got to be removed before he destroys the supreme court's reputation completely. it is bad enough already with roberts (poor little rich boy), alito (sad example of jurisprudence), scalia (he makes neanderthals look intelligent) and kennedy (suck up man). they are all examples of privilege over the normal americans (who are stupid enough).
ashling
(25,771 posts)OK, not always,
but at least twice (maybe even more) I said that this man would succumb to his own anger
gratuitous
(82,849 posts)He stepped down from the Supreme Court when it was obliquely suggested that at age 90 he was slipping mentally. Not only is Scalia not in Justice Holmes' league judicially speaking, Scalia's about five notches below Holmes on the gentleman scale.
greatlaurel
(2,004 posts)When Nina Totenberg can mock a Supreme Court Justice, it is time to retire.
Cha
(297,184 posts)Ikonoklast
(23,973 posts)Arrogance usually makes enemies of former allies.
Cha
(297,184 posts)diane in sf
(3,913 posts)kelliekat44
(7,759 posts)He is a product of fiction told over and over again. Go read his opinions and see for yourself. He and Thomas are two peas in a pod.
Crunchy Frog
(26,579 posts)and there will be no accountability whatsoever.
chrisstopher
(152 posts)If president Obama got to replace him before his term is up?
MADem
(135,425 posts)out of trouble...what are those clerks doing all day? Playing video games and watching soap operas?
Are they all a bunch of Liberty University grads? That would explain a good bit of the stupidity!
"It's almost as embarrassing not to know federal law as it is not to know your own opinion."
trublu992
(489 posts)ronnie624
(5,764 posts)Last edited Sat May 3, 2014, 08:55 AM - Edit history (1)
Historic NY
(37,449 posts)GoneFishin
(5,217 posts)greatlaurel
(2,004 posts)It needs to be brought up and discussed over and over about this unprecedented mistake of Scalia's. Nino's No-no should be blogged about constantly until he is driven from the court. The man is an intellectual light weight who has only been given any credence due to his consistent rulings in favor of the rich and powerful.
He is certainly showing signs of some sort of mental decline.
GoneFishin
(5,217 posts)to keep him on the bench as long as possible would be gratifying too.
Blue_In_AK
(46,436 posts)bearssoapbox
(1,408 posts)With the way the rethugs and right-wing have gone off the rails since Obama was elected, they have said and done many things that have baffled sane and reasonable people without there being any repercussions for their actions.
The Bundy militia pointing weapons at federal agents.
The Snowbilly Grifter with her crosshairs on Democrats stunt.
Some rethugs still won't admit that President Obama's birth certificate is real or that he's an American.
In general, the complete and utter total disrespect that has been shown to President Obama since before he was even elected that, for the most part, they haven't been called out on.
That lack of respect has been spread to how they treat the rest of the democrats, left, liberals, etc. because they know that they can get away with it most of the time.
If he is getting senile or demented, maybe it's letting his racism, misogyny and bigotry come more readily to the surface.
Either way...
He has become the poster image for term limits.