Supreme Court, long quiet, ends term with a growl

[unapatriciated]

WASHINGTON — For most of the term, Supreme Court justices showed remarkable restraint. They displayed broad agreement even in some volatile areas and refrained from angry dissents.

Then they decided the tough cases.

The court, in its three most important cases, declared a constitutional right to have guns at home for self-defense, granted some constitutional protections to foreign prisoners at Guantanamo Bay and outlawed the death penalty for people who rape children.

Not only did the familiar ideological divisions return in these cases and several others, but the justices took turns hurling charges of "judicial activism" and worse at each other.

Giving rights to the detainees "will almost certainly cause more Americans to be killed," Justice Antonin Scalia said in a scathing dissent he read from the bench.

No one threw that line back at Scalia in the guns case. But Justice John Paul Stevens, also summarizing his dissent in court, said of Scalia's majority opinion on gun rights that "adherence to a policy of judicial restraint by this court is far wiser than the bold decision it announced today."

http://www.comcast.net/articles/news-general/20080628/Scotus.Unrestrained.Finish/

[LiberalFighter]

1. Which one can we push out? I would love to see scalia and thomas harrassed out of office.

[unapatriciated]

2. scalia would be my first choice.

unfortunately both he (72) and thomas(60) are not the oldest on the court. We need this election just to keep what little balance we have.

edited to correct ages

[Super Soaker Sniper]

4. Really think that would happen?

To what end?

[ladjf]

5. We couldn't do worse than Scalia or Thomas if we selected

names out of the phone book at random.

[Hosnon]

3. To be honest (and to go against my self-interest as a progressive/liberal)

I favor a 4-4, conservative-liberal split with a moderate ninth justice. This seems to be what we have, even if the identity of the relative members is not always the same for every case.