While I'm no fan of Thomas, I do think he has a valid point. Justices converse with themselves during oral arguments and use the litigants as mere props. They can have these converstations outside of oral arguments. It reminds me of 1L year when the smart azz speaks for the sake of hearing himself speak. Perhaps some of the other Justices should take note and tone down their questioning.

but if you want to hear what the litigants have to say, read the brief. The point of the oral arguments is for the justices to ask the questions they had after reading the briefs.

I agree with 1:02 that some of the justices are showoffs (cough cough, Nino).

But not a single question in two years is extreme.

It's hard to Thomas to ask questions when he doesn't understand the content of hte briefs or the arguments...

He's probably thinking about renewing his Good Sam Club membership and his fancy RV.

the bench was much more quiet prior to the 1980s. attorneys could speak for 10- 20 minutes uninterrupted.

"It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to speak out and remove all doubt"
- Abraham Lincoln

Honest Abe > Quiet Clarence

Thomas knows how to talk when he wants.

http://www.oyez.org/cases/1990-1999/1998/1998_98_369/argument/

thurgood marshall was not an active questioner, yet somehow i am sure several idiots will talk about how clarence thomas does not understand this or that...

Who is this guy?? He looks like Danny Glover.

1:17, I think you nailed it.

Even a fool, when he holdeth his peace, is counted wise: and he that shutteth his lips is esteemed a man of understanding. -- Bible, 'Proverbs' 17:28.

the desparate left-wing bomb-throwing by 1:17 and 1:20 has removed all doubt for me...

Being the strict constructionist that Thomas is, he doesn't need to ask questions because he's already made his decision before the argument begins. Further, if he did have a question, it was probably alread asked by Nino.

20% of the stories I read on ATL, I read on Law.com the day before. Including this one. ATL sucks!!

justice breyer does not even ask questions. he converses with himself. he poses elaborate examples and then forgets what he said and then mumbles to himself and then scalia, thankfully, cuts him off...

"I'm gettin' too old for this sh!t."

as was posted before - Thomas asks one question in each argument - "Justice Scalia, how should I vote?"

Does anyone know the last question Justice Thomas asked?

"Does anyone know the last question Justice Thomas asked?"

Yeah, I believe it was to your mother. He asked, "Do you spit or swallow?"

rmm (aka 1:30 and 1:37) - I apologize. I meant to give you a sense of humor. Unfortunately, I forgot.

Love,

G-d

P.S. I am a liberal too, but I have a GREAT sense of humor - how else do you think G-Dub became President. It was an opportunity that I could not pass up!

Typical liberals - caricaturizing someone as dumb simply because he is black.

It's one thing to not ask questions, it's another thing to constantly have your hand on your head and look like you're going to pass out, while reclining back in your seat. Anyone who has seen Thomas live in the SC knows what I'm talking about. It's a disgrace that he can't even sit up straight and APPEAR to be paying attention for two hours a day.

Ginsburg is asleep half the time. How is that not a disgrace?

2:44-if i remember reading this correctly in another book, justices white and stewart used to send notes back and forth between each other during oral argument talking about baseball scores. in your world, the only thing that can be a disgrace is a minority conservative...like me.

ginsburg forgets where she is half the time and thinks the age of consent should be lowered to 12...is this the women's liberation the country has been desiring? NARAL, NOW, and Planned Parenthood....where are you when we need less irrational discourse?

Thomas doesn't write many opinions either. He's pretty useless.

2:44, I like that we are now assigning value to *pretending* to find the rambling of the other justices important or interesting. Go listen to one of reargued cases (in particular, Ga v. Randolph) from when Alito joined the bench to remove all doubt about the aims of the justices who speak out. The other 7, particularly Breyer and Scalia, who never run out of things to say, talked nonstop, even though they had already had a previous argument to ask anything that actually needed to be asked. The lawyers who appear before the SCt are mostly of sufficient caliber that they have actually covered important points in their briefs, rather than depending on justices to raise them. The incessant chatter is a) to get quoted in news articles b) to get a laugh out of the audience or look smart and c) to try to convince the other justices of your opinion.

2:44, I like that we are now assigning value to *pretending* to find the rambling of the other justices important or interesting. Go listen to one of reargued cases (in particular, Ga v. Randolph) from when Alito joined the bench to remove all doubt about the aims of the justices who speak out. The other 7, particularly Breyer and Scalia, who never run out of things to say, talked nonstop, even though they had already had a previous argument to ask anything that actually needed to be asked. The lawyers who appear before the SCt are mostly of sufficient caliber that they have actually covered important points in their briefs, rather than depending on justices to raise them. The incessant chatter is a) to get quoted in news articles b) to get a laugh out of the audience or look smart and c) to try to convince the other justices of your opinion.

Is 3:14 a joke? I hope so. Majority opinions are assigned and equalized, and Justice Thomas is often second in number of separate opinions to Justice Stevens. If what you're thinking is that he doesn't write many of the blockbuster opinions, that's for obvious reasons - he is never the senior justice in the majority and thus never gets to assign.

"Thomas asks one question in each argument - 'Justice Scalia, how should I vote?' "

Ha ha. Because Thomas is black, he must just be a clone who can't think for himself. Ha ha. I get it. Kind of like Marshall and Brennan. Ha ha--oops, that's not funny.

I just have one question for you: did you think of that all by YOURSELF?

Not GA v. Randolph - sorry. Hudson v. Michigan.

Not GA v. Randolph - sorry. Hudson v. Michigan.

3:39 - ah, it's not because of his race, but because he nearly always votes with Scalia. Thanks for seeing racial bias (what you want to see) where it doesn't exist.

3:47, but why wasn't the same point made with Marshall and Brennan? It's not so much racial bias as it is the belief that black conservatives are per se intellectually inferior.

My middle name is Thomas.

Um, because (1) Marshall and Brennan ask questions at argument, and (2) this thread was about THOMAS.

I have no racial agenda. Sorry to dissapoint you.

3:47- the facts may get in the way of your hallucinations, but these pairs of justices, according to scotusblog, have agreed with each other more often then scalia-thomas (76%) this year...

robert-scalia 82%
roberts-kennedy 88%
roberts breyer 81%
stevens-souter 82%
stevens ginsburg 82%
stevens breyer 81%
scalia-breyer 81%
kennedy-breyer 81%
souter-breyer 100%
breyer-alito 81%

http://www.scotusblog.com/wp/term-tracker/new-statpack-including-first-justice-agreement-stats/

this is the pdf for you...

http://www.scotusblog.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2008/02/statpack_2-22-08.pdf

patiently awaiting your rant...

1:59 p.m. - As I recall, the last time CT asked a question was in Holmes v. South Carolina. The argument is available at www.oyez.org.

4:42 - How did you do on the LSAT? You appear to have poor reading comprehension skills. If you look, I never said that Scalia and Thomas agree more or less than any other potential combination. I just said that Thomas "nearly always" (and I'll take slightly better than 3/4 as "nearly always") votes with Scalia. Thanks for, again, reading what you wanted to read as opposed to what was written. Your boss must love your work.

4:58- then using your logic, all of the combinations i have listed would involve justices other than thomas asking eahc other how they were going to vote. the scalia-thomas combo is just the 11th most predictable combmination. consideraing that thomas is the only justice not in the top 10, i'd say he is not really all that predictable...

please stop drooling, you may dehydrate...

You guys are all f'n retarded.

5:03 - see comment at 3:47 - comments to Thomas made in isolation, on a Thomas thread, based on his lack of questioning

oh, AND IT WAS A F'ING JOKE

kthnxbai

Here are words that Justice Thomas can say that none of you hacks will ever utter: I'm a Supreme Court Justice Biyatch!! For Life. Holla!

3:47/4:58,

Did one of you put pubes on my Coke?

1:08---Agree completely. If judges don't ask questions and debate with one another, then there's no point to holding oral argument. Otherwise, every case could just be decided on the briefs. Admittedly, sometimes judges ask off-the-wall questions at oral argument that the lawyers are unprepared to answer, and the oral argument once again becomes pointless. But Supreme Court litigators are supposed to be clever enough to be able to answer just about any pertinent question.

In sum, anyone who buys the "silence is golden" argument probably hasn't spent much time in court.

There's nothing racist about calling Thomas dumb. Which he is.

Pretty sure that if Alito were silent at oral arguments, he would not be characterized as "dumb," "stupid" or unable to think for himself as often as Thomas is. There is most definitely a racist undertoe for many who denigrate Thomas's intelligence. (And remember the bizarre assertion a while back that Thomas writes at a 4th grade level?)

Deny all you want. But the latent bigotry is not hard to spot.

Alito would not be called "dumb" or "unable to think for himself" because Alito has a strong existing resume of him being highly intelligent and accomplished, even by the standards of his profession.

Thomas has...nothing. I see nine years as a crony in the EEOC as his most significant accomplishment.

Guys in my high school sat through oral arguments all the time without asking questions. It was no big deal.