Orrin Hatch's Narcissistic Quest For Recognition

A war is raging over the name of this courthouse.

I spent last week in Salt Lake City to speak at the Utah State Bar Fall Forum on dealing with the legal media. The best part about traveling around the country and dropping in on other legal markets is the opportunity to hear the legal stories that don’t always float to ATL’s New York headquarters. Like how Donald Trump’s people are trumpeting the Department of Justice practice of shutting down the Mormons. Or the hotly contested battle over the name of the new federal courthouse.

[Rep. Chris] Stewart, R-Utah, said [] during the ceremony that he intends to introduce legislation to put longtime Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch’s name on the outside. He acknowledged that couldn’t happen until January 2018 [sic, it’s actually January 2019] when Hatch ends his seventh and what he said would be his last term in the Senate.

“I just don’t think there’s anyone that has had more impact not just on the state but on the nation and has worked on the judiciary and worked with the federal bench. I felt like that’s a great honor for him and appropriate,” Stewart said after the event.

Hatch called that prospect “embarrassing” and not something he seeks.

Let me tell you something about the phrase “not something he seeks.” It means, “totally something he seeks.” If he weren’t masterminding this effort to get his name on this building, he’d quash these rumors immediately and throw his support behind an alternative. And it’s not like there aren’t viable alternatives — like a U.S. Supreme Court justice:

Two camps have quietly tussled over the honor even as construction crews continue to work on the new federal courthouse, slated to open in March. On one side is an aggressive litigator hoping to honor a legendary and long-deceased founder of his law firm, and on the other side are friends of Sen. Orrin Hatch. It really isn’t a fair fight.

“My sense is that no one wants to get in the way of Senator Hatch if he wants his name on that building,” said Andrew Morse, president of Snow, Christensen & Martineau.

Morse has prodded members of Congress and their advisers and sent letters to the Senate Judiciary Committee, but he has struggled to find anyone willing to sponsor a bill to name the structure after George Sutherland, the only Utahn to ever serve on the U.S. Supreme Court.

Or a former Solicitor General (coincidentally the father of Utah’s other Senator, Mike Lee). Basically, anybody who actually can have the building named after them. But no, this transparent effort to get a building named after him will leave the building in limbo until 2019.

Morse sees the rules as his opening, giving him time to persuade Congress to look past their colleague and give due consideration to a political legend from the turn of the century.

“You can’t let the building go nameless for five years. That’s like letting your kid go to first grade before giving him a name,” Morse argues before sarcastically suggesting the building should be named “from a list of Utahns who have been on the Supreme Court.”

Well, yeah. It is kind of ridiculous to have a building just sitting there waiting to be named after a guy who publicly says he doesn’t want it named after him when there’s a perfectly good legal luminary sitting there in the form of a Supreme Court justice. That said, Justice Sutherland was the leader of the Four Horsemen so maybe slapping his name on a huge public works project isn’t the most fitting tribute. And Orrin Hatch has sat on the Judiciary Committee since the Earth cooled.

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But Congressman Rob Bishop perfectly captures the real irony of this whole affair:

“It is the ugliest building in Salt Lake City. Why would anyone want their name attached to that thing?”

Indeed. It really is atrociously ugly.

Ah! A neo-modern abortion of a design plopped into the middle of a skyline with which it shares nothing. Everyone at the Utah Bar gathering had their own derogatory nickname for it ranging from “The Cheese Grater” to “The Borg Cube.” That’s what happens when you don’t give something a proper name… people make up their own and they’re usually not kind.

But beauty is in the eye of the egotistical Senator, I suppose. In any event, pre-congratulations to Senator Hatch on having the ugliest building in Salt Lake named after you.

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Rep. Chris Stewart wants to name new federal courthouse for Sen. Orrin Hatch [Deseret News]
Sutherland v. Hatch: Whose name on new federal courthouse? [Salt Lake Tribune]
Trump spokeswoman said U.S. Justice Department shut down Mormon churches [KUTV]