Alan Dershowitz: The Truth About Chief Justice Rehnquist

[Sandpiper]

I'm not sure if this has been posted or not. But for those who haven't seen this, it's an excellent synopsis on what a nasty old bigot the late Chief Justice was:


Telling the Truth About Chief Justice Rehnquist
09.04.2005

My mother always told me that when a person dies, one should not say anything bad about him. My mother was wrong. History requires truth, not puffery or silence, especially about powerful governmental figures. And obituaries are a first draft of history.

So here’s the truth about Chief Justice Rehnquist you won’t hear on Fox News or from politicians. Chief Justice William Rehnquist set back liberty, equality, and human rights perhaps more than any American judge of this generation. His rise to power speaks volumes about the current state of American values.

Let’s begin at the beginning. Rehnquist bragged about being first in his class at Stanford Law School. Today Stanford is a great law school with a diverse student body, but in the late 1940s and early 1950s, it discriminated against Jews and other minorities, both in the admission of students and in the selection of faculty. Justice Stephen Breyer recalled an earlier period of Stanford’s history: “When my father was at Stanford, he could not join any of the social organizations because he was Jewish, and those organizations, at that time, did not accept Jews.”

Rehnquist not only benefited in his class ranking from this discrimination; he was also part of that bigotry. When he was nominated to be an associate justice in 1971, I learned from several sources who had known him as a student that he had outraged Jewish classmates by goose-stepping and heil-Hitlering with brown-shirted friends in front of a dormitory that housed the school’s few Jewish students. He also was infamous for telling racist and anti-Semitic jokes.

<snip>



http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alan-dershowitz/telling-the-truth-about-c_b_6844.html

[despairing optimist]

1. And how much did Dershowitz set back due process by supporting torture?

Pot, meet kettle.

[Orrex]

4. Jeez, you called that right

I used to admire Dershowitz's writings on morality in the absence of a god.

But then he started with that "sometimes torture is okay" line of bullshit, and after that I just can't read or listen to him.

[TaleWgnDg]

11. Come on, DU . . . one more recommendation . . . and keep it kicked . . .

.

And Sandpiper (OP), thanks for posting this important information about the late William H. Rehnquist, Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.



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[Usrename]

14. Except they don't do it like that anymore.

No blue slips, no committee vote Rule 4a any more (rule required one minority vote to leave committee, overruled by the chair orin hatch, parlimenterian says hatch interprets the rules) so all disputes blow up to the Senate floor.

Didn't you get the memo? They make it up as they go along.

Rehnquist should have spanked Ken Starr for nasty attack on Clinton. That was unAmerican.

[TaleWgnDg]

15. yeah, I got "that memo" . . . in fact, I may have written that memo

a few years back when writing blogs weren't as "fashionable" as today. Heh.

As for that Rehnquist "spank" . . . why? Didn't you read Dershowitz where Dershowitz points to Rehnquist's dishonesty in his results-oriented jurisprudence. Are you not aware that result-oriented jurist conclusions are dishonest? Now, I ask, how can a dishonest jurist render parental discipline to someone with whom he agrees as I am sure he did with Ken Starr? Merely because the famous law school professor of legal ethics at Georgetown University of Law, Samual Dash, walked away from Ken Starr doesn't, on the other hand, indicate that the Chief Justice would do so!
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[nothingshocksmeanymore]

13. A-fucking-men

[stickdog]

17. I agree with Dershowitz here 100%. But I can't help but wonder

if he would have cared if Rehnquist's sins were primarily directed against Muslims.

[ikojo]

18. or would he care if Rehnquist's sins were primarily directed

against blacks.

Somehow I suspect Mr Dershowitz would be writing a glowing obit for Mr Rehnquist. I am not saying Mr D is a prejudiced (as a white guy he can't help but have some racist feelings since it is part of the culture in the US)...I am saying that what Jews suffered in the 1940s and 1950s with regard to college admissions PALES in comparison to the CONTINUED suffereing blacks and poor people in this country endure DAILY in 2005.

So, Mr Dershowitz, what are you doing TODAY in the 21st century to help those who CURRENTLY experience exclusion based upon their skin color and class position?

I speak as a Jew, but I really believe Jews got lucky in this country when we were accepted as white.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

21. Why Would Dershowitz Ever Defend Rehnquist?

He's been railing against right wing judges from the moment he got in the public eye.....

[Dudley_DUright]

2. I posted it yesterday in Editorials

but it is worth posting in GD. Highly recommended.

[TaleWgnDg]

12. yup. agreed. . . . n/t

[babylonsister]

3. I'm saving for myself and others-thanks! nt

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

5. What an interesting Supreme Court we've had

Rehnquist the goose-stepping Nazi.
Scalia the orgy fiend.
Clarence Thomas the porno addict and sexual harrasser.

Fine bunch.

[bobbieinok]

6. Savage hates Ginsberg...calls it the 'liberal Ginsberg court'

she's also nearly 70, isn't she??

and others??? Thomas and Scalia are pretty young, I think

[More Than A Feeling]

8. Man, "liberal Ginsberg court" sounds wonderful, doesn't it?

IF only it were true!

[bribri16]

7. I remember when he was first appointed and LSD accusations by some of

his peers. I remember well. I don't know if it will show up on Google but the archives of newspapers then should have something.

[bribri16]

9. And no, I am not talking about his rulings on LSD, I'm talking about his

use of drugs, including LSD.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

20. He Was Addicted To Prescription Pain Killers...

This LSD accusation is new....

[TaleWgnDg]

10. I agree with Professor Alan Dershowitz . . . good for him !!

.
Well? Rehnquist was result-oriented which is the most horrific blast one can make in the legal community against a judge. You see, "result-oriented" means that the judge knew the result he wanted. And to achieve that result the judge would squeeze, manipulate, and twist the law to obtain that result. Ultimately, a result-oriented judge is a biased judge not objective as judges need to be. A judge who cannot make decisions to benefit the parties in a case or the law, and in Rehnquist's position, the constitution and the American people.

In addition, I've pondered how or why Rehnquist could achieve his high rank at Stanford after seeing, reading, and legally analyzing his written legal opinions and other writings. For those written opinions are not scholarly by any measure of the Queen's English or American jurisprudence. Professor Dershowitz pulls back that curtain as did Justice Breyer in an unrelated manner.

Further, it was painful to be aware of Rehnquist's repeated anti-semitism through-out his lifetime and his negativism toward Hispanics, blacks, and minorities in general, particularly his pervasive and inflexible ignorance regarding gender discrimination. He was completely out of touch. And, without question, Rehnquist was a homophobe.

Overall, I agree whole-heartedly with Professor Dershowitz. I've seen and stated the same many times myself about Chief Justice Rehnquist. And, I, too, refuse to shut-up upon the death of Rehnquist. It would be dishonest of me to be silent as it would be for Dershowitz.

I strongly suggest that DUers read carefully and closely Professor Dershowitz's commentary about the late Chief Justice William H. Renhquist, the state's rights devotee except when it wasn't the end to which he sought, e.g., Bush v. Gore 531 U.S. 98 (2000). I make this recommendation as a lawyer, myself, who has carefully studied the U.S. Supreme Court since its inception but with particular attention and first-hand knowledge of the Warren era through to Rehnquist's Court.

I make one exception to my above comments. Rehnquist wrote some very good laymen's books about the U.S. Supreme Court and impeachment of both federal judges/justices and of presidents. Again, not scholarly but adequate if done with reasonable historic and legal research as Renhquist did in these instances.

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[TaleWgnDg]

16. kick

[xchrom]

19. not a dershowitz fan -- but

info is info.

sometimes i'll take it where i can get it.