Indecent burial: Justice with an agenda

[pscot]

Linda Greenhouse is the sharpest observer of todays Supremes. She also has a superb bullshit detector.

When Justice John Paul Stevens received the Rehnquist draft, he immediately understood its implications. “..... “As you know, I am not in favor of overruling Roe v. Wade, but if the deed is to be done I would rather see the court give the case a decent burial instead of tossing it out the window of a fast-moving caboose.”


.. I thought of it two weeks ago when I read the Supreme Court’s latest campaign finance ruling, McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission. This time, five justices did actually manage to toss something out the window: the post-Watergate system of campaign finance regulation......


My interest here is less the real-world impact than what the decision tells us about the Supreme Court and Chief Justice Roberts, who at this rate and at age 59 figures to be with us a good deal longer than campaign finance laws. Deregulating campaign finance is clearly part of his long-term project. In the course of his opinion, the chief justice made some moves that are worth highlighting for the way in which they illuminate both his method and his priorities.....

I doubt that even a few years ago, the District of Columbia Circuit or any federal court would have invoked the First Amendment to strike down this regulation. In the campaign-finance context, the justices may say they support disclosure and I’m willing to assume they believe what they say – for now. But events have a way of slipping out of control once a court starts tossing important principles out the window of a fast-moving caboose.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/17/opinion/an-indecent-burial.html?ref=opinion